Insights Into Reflection and Pre-service Teacher Education

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Insights Into Reflection and Pre-service TeacherEducation: An Hermeneutic PhenomenologyAndrea M. GelfusoUniversity of South Florida, [email protected]

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Insights Into Reflection and Pre-service Teacher Education: An Hermeneutic

Phenomenology

by

Andrea Gelfuso

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment

of the requirements for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

Department of Childhood Education literacy Studies

College of Education

University of South Florida

Major Professor: Jenifer Schneider, Ph.D.

Jolyn Blank, Ph.D.

Christopher DeLuca, Ph.D.

Danielle Dennis, Ph.D.

Date of Approval:

October 31, 2013

Keywords: judgment, knowledgeable other, supervision, fusion of horizons

Copyright © 2013, Andrea Gelfuso

Dedication

Each strand of your life will weave together with the last to prepare you for the next.

Al Nearing

Acknowledgments

I wish here to acknowledge those who, with me, have created the strands of my life and

those who have helped me weave them together. I acknowledge my grandparents Tomas Gelfuso

and Vincenza Gelfuso, who both loved me and through dying taught me how to live. Thank you.

I acknowledge Audrey Radley ‘Gaudy Audy’, who helped me develop a love of nature. Thank

you. Louis and Kim Gelfuso, my parents, who love me and gave me the freedom to pursue my

interests. Thank you. Joseph Gelfuso, who taught me that sometimes when you’re stuck in a tree

you have to jump. Lisa Gelfuso, who taught me people can rise from the most difficult situations.

Thank you. Brian Kier, who gave me the freedom to teach and so learn from teaching. Thank

you. Jerry Hatler, who taught me that it is possible to make a vision come to fruition. Thank you.

Shannon McNulty, who taught me that working together is better than working alone. Thank

you. Judie Clanton, who taught me that school would continue to go on without me even if I

wasn’t there for a day. Thank you. All of my former students, who taught me that teaching and

learning are intensely personal, purposeful acts. Thank you. Dani James, who taught me to not

forget the zeal with which young people enter the profession. Thank you. Jolyn Blank, who

taught me the importance of playfulness in research. Thank you. Chris DeLuca, who introduced

me to hermeneutics and taught me the joy of thinking deeply and having conversations about

methodology. Thank you. Danielle Dennis, who taught me to approach my work with a sense of

humor. Thank you. Jenifer Schneider, my knowledgeable other, who created dissonance for me

and helped propel me through

reflection and this dissertation. Thank you. Diane Herring, who first taught me the great

responsibility one assumes when they are a teacher. Thank you. Harley, who taught me that

sometimes you need to take to a break. Linda Smith, who taught me that teaching is a noble

profession and a such, the acts of teaching and learning should be approached with love, rigor,

and reverence. Thank you. Ken Wick, who taught me to close my eyes, shut my mouth, and

listen to myself breathe. Thank you. And as always Al Nearing, who taught me. Thank you.

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Table of Contents

Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iv

Chapter One .....................................................................................................................................1

Introduction ................................................................................................................................1

Scene One: Teaching and Learning in Ms. Smith’s Room .....................................................1

Scene Two: Teaching and Learning in Ms. Vanderpool’s Room ...........................................2

Embedded within the Scenes ..................................................................................................2

Behind the Scenes ...................................................................................................................3

Rationale .................................................................................................................................5

Theory and Definitions ...........................................................................................................6

Overview of Study ................................................................................................................12

Chapter Two...................................................................................................................................13

Examining the Theoretical Assumptions Which Undergird Research in the

Reflective Practices of Pre-service Teachers .....................................................................13

Abstract ........................................................................................................................................13

Introduction ..............................................................................................................................14

Reflection: Current Understandings .......................................................................................15

Methods....................................................................................................................................23

Research Questions ...............................................................................................................23

Inclusion Criteria ..................................................................................................................23

Obtaining Data ......................................................................................................................24

Analyzing and Synthesizing: Creating New Understandings ..............................................24

Interpretations and Discussion: New Insights into Studying Reflections ............................27

Reflection as Non-Communal Activity ................................................................................27

In isolation without support structures ............................................................................27

In isolation with support structures .................................................................................28

In isolation using the mediums of video and writing ......................................................31

In asynchronous dialogic interaction with peers .............................................................40

In asynchronous dialogic interaction with peers and instructors ....................................42

In synchronous dialogic relation with peers and collaborating teachers ........................46

Implications for Future Study ..................................................................................................52

ii

Chapter Three.................................................................................................................................55

Methodology/Methods .............................................................................................................55

Introduction ..............................................................................................................................55

Context .....................................................................................................................................56

Dana ......................................................................................................................................56

My Role as Knowledgeable Other ........................................................................................58

The Elementary Teacher Residency Program .......................................................................61

Teaching Cycles ....................................................................................................................62

Conditions for Reflection ......................................................................................................64

Methods....................................................................................................................................67

Pre-Understandings ..................................................................................................................71

Maya Angelou ..........................................................................................................................71

Hermeneutic Phenomenology ..................................................................................................76

Hermeneutic Data Creation/Analysis Cycles........................................................................76

The Pursuit of Understanding Within the Hermeneutic Circle .............................................80

Bridling Pre-understandings .................................................................................................81

Hermeneutic Windows..........................................................................................................82

Chapter Four ..................................................................................................................................84

Understandings ........................................................................................................................84

Introduction ..............................................................................................................................84

Hermeneutic Windows.............................................................................................................85

(Dis)positions: Tendencies Toward Temporary Places ........................................................86

‘Staying With’ Dissonance: The Roles Judgment and Knowledgeable Others

Others Play in the Phases of Reflections ........................................................................95

Writing: A Tool for Propelling Dana Into and Through Reflections .................................109

Conclusion .............................................................................................................................116

Chapter Five .................................................................................................................................117

Possibilities ............................................................................................................................117

Hermeneutic Phenomenology: An Ongoing Affair ..............................................................117

What is Reflection? ................................................................................................................118

Conclusions for Reflection ....................................................................................................123

Capturing Experiences ...........................................................................................................123

Gathering Evidence/Juxtaposing Ideas/Creating Dissonance .............................................125

Staying with Dissoance .......................................................................................................129

The Role of the Knowledgeable Other: Implications for Teacher Educators ...............129

Future of Horizons: A Heuristic for Facilitating Reflections ...............................................135

References ....................................................................................................................................138

Appendices ...................................................................................................................................121

Appendix A: Levels of Reflection ........................................................................................148

Appendix B: Summary of Empirical Studies.........................................................................152 Appendix C: Locating Dissonance, Judgement, Knowledgeable Others,

and Dialectic Tension ........................................................................................................174

Appendix D. Graphic Organizer of Created Patterns ............................................................177

iii

Appendix E. Date Creation Timeline....................................................................................178

Appendix F. Post-Conference Video Viewing Log ..............................................................179

Appendix G. Initial Phrases, Clusters, Themes ....................................................................181

Appendix H. Essential Themes Related to the Experience of Reflection .............................204

Appendix I. Eight Pillars of Effective Literacy Instruction ................................................206

iv

Abstract

With recent calls for teacher education programs to increase both the quantity and quality

of field experiences (NCATE, 2010), it is important for teacher educators to understand how pre-

service teachers create meaning from those experiences. Reflection is a mode of thought

historically associated with creating “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) from

experience. Therefore, reflection is a common component of many teacher education programs

(Darling-Hammond, 2010). Despite the abundance of research that has been conducted about

reflection and teacher education, little is understood about the process of supported reflection as

it is experienced by pre-service teachers. In this hermeneutic phenomenology, I explored the

described experience of reflection for one pre-service teacher with whom I worked. Findings

from this study created new understandings about reflection which include: (dis)positions may be

tendencies toward temporary places rather than static, pre-determined qualities, dissonance

appears to be present throughout the reflection process, judgment and knowledgeable others play

key roles in the reflection process, and coding, note-taking, and writing appear to be ways for

pre-service teachers and university supervisors to create texts that can be juxtaposed to create

dissonance and dialectic tension.

1

Chapter 1:

Introduction

Education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living.

John Dewey

Scene One: Teaching and Learning in Ms. Smith’s Room

I see a room of eighteen eight-year-olds, second graders maybe. In the corner I see a

group of three children, one sitting with his legs outstretched, back against the wall, reading from

a book titled Rainforest Babies. Another child is on her knees bent over what looks like a pile of

trade books, notebooks, and various writing tools. The third child is on her belly with bent knees

and feet criss-crossing behind her as she is reading about medicinal plants located in the

rainforest. Her chin rests in her hands as she shouts in disbelief, “Plants can be used for

medicine!?” A teacher enters the conversation by sitting on the floor, her feet kicked to the side.

Her elbow is on her leg and her chin is in her hand. She looks at the child and asks, “So what did

you find out?” A conversation ensues during which the child is talking about what she is

thinking, pointing out interesting parts of the book she is reading and the sticky notes posted

throughout the book on which are written questions she has. I see both the child and teacher

thinking and looking for information. “You know,” the teacher says, “I was just talking with

Devon over there” she points across the room to a child sitting in front of the computer, “he is

reading about deforestation and how people are cutting down large parts of the rainforest, I

wonder what impact that would have on the plants you are reading about. I think the

2

two of you should get together and share your information to see what you can make of it.” The

child gathers her things and heads across the room shouting, “Hey, Devon, did you know there

are important plants in that rainforest!?” The teacher smirks and looks up to the rest of the

children in the group, “So, how are you all coming along?”

Scene Two: Teaching and Learning in Ms. Vanderpool’s Room

I see a room of eighteen eight-year-olds, second graders maybe. I see a group of four

children sitting at their desks. They are reading a printed out article about the rainforest and

deforestation. On the top of the sheet in all capital letters are the words: FOCUS SKILL: MAIN

IDEA & DETAIL. One boy is reading the article out loud and stumbling over many words. The

girl to his left has her head in her hand and she is easily reading the text and answering the

questions at the bottom of the page. The two other children have stopped reading and are now

talking to each other about the biggest snakes they have ever seen. Their arms are outstretched to

show how long the snakes were. A teacher comes over. She stands next to group. “What are we

supposed to be doing?” The boys drop their heads and look at each other. “You need to read this

article and find the main idea. How do we find the main idea?” The girl raises her head and says,

“it is what it is mostly about.” “That’s right, Amanda, how smart!” the teacher smiles. “Where do

we find the main idea? Is it in the beginning, the middle, or the end?” she asks. “The beginning?”

one of the boys says with little confidence. The teacher congratulates him and says “That’s right.

Good job. Keep reading.” as she moves to the next group.

Embedded within the Scenes

In scene one, children were authentically engaged in reading and writing to find

information about self-selected areas of interest regarding the rainforest. They seemed to

effortlessly read and reread multiple texts, attend to text structures, determine importance,

3

synthesize information, record their thinking. During this time they were practicing, with

guidance, what to do when they come across a word they can’t read, how to figure out what

words mean, how to mentally organize the information they read. After they gathered

information they had to make decisions about what medium they would use the share their

information with others (video, poster, photoessay, book, comic-strip, etc). The atmosphere in

the room was that of focused energy, authenticity, and joy.

In scene two, some children were able to read the article and answer the questions with

ease. Others were unable to decode the text with any amount of accuracy that would lead to

comprehension. Some were frustrated, some were bored, some were happy that they were doing

a ‘good job.’ Those who were able to read the article and answer the questions engaged in what

amounts to test-taking practice. Those who were unable to read and understand the text were not

engaged in reading practice at all. The atmosphere in the room was that of dullness,

complacency, and artificiality.

Behind the Scenes

For scene one to happen, the teacher reviewed her data about the independent reading

levels (Fountas & Pinnell, 1996) of her students. She gathered books from a number of places

(school book room, personal collection, colleagues classroom libraries, school library,

surrounding public libraries) that were representative of the independent levels of her students.

She taught her students how to select books that were at their independent reading levels

(Routman,1991) to help them decide for themselves how to choose texts that are just right for

them to read. She modeled reading strategies (Harvey & Goudvis, 2000; Keene, 2008; Keene &

Zimmerman, 1997) and how to navigate informational text (Harvey, 1998). She knew, from

anecdotal notes, which of her students needed guidance as they came across words they could

4

not read in text and she was sure to visit those students during their work with that in mind. She

needed to visit the students’ work after school to determine what kind of support particular

students needed the next day to continue developing their literacy practices. She knew the

difference between superficial talk and engaging in authentic conversation (Johnson, 2004;

Miller, 2008) with a child designed to provide support for their learning as well as honor and

respect their work. She knew that reading and writing are reciprocal and mutually reenforced

when done in conjunction with one another. She knew the importance of integration

(Cunningham and Allington, 2011), both within elements of literacy and across content areas.

She knew children are motivated when they are given choice, challenge, and authentic projects

(Miller, 2002). She planned this sequence of learning experiences with these things in mind.

For scene two to occur, the teacher tore out the page in the FCAT practice book with

main idea and detail on it. She gave it to the students. She told the students that the main idea is

what the article is mostly about and that it is usually at the beginning of the article. The teacher

monitored the children to make sure they were on task. The teacher needed limited knowledge

and understanding of children and literacy practices to enact this form of teaching.

The above two scenes beg the question, how do people (pre-service teachers) learn to

become teachers who are able to use research-based practices to facilitate learning, as illustrated

in scene one? This is a question I am intensely interested in and I believe the pivotal difference

among teachers is reflection, the ability to have an experience and think about it in a way that

creates new understandings about teaching and learning. For pre-service teachers this means

reflecting on their field experiences in ways that create new understandings about teaching and

learning. As a former classroom teacher who facilitated learning much like the learning

illustrated in scene one, I know this is possible. I know that engagement with influential mentors

5

(knowledgeable others) and my ability to reflect on my field experiences, created understandings

about teaching and learning and perhaps more importantly cultivated in me an insatiable desire to

understand my own and children’s learning. However, as a current teacher of pre-service

teachers, I have experienced the difficulty in facilitating their learning about teaching and

learning. It is complicated. This dissertation is intended to create new understandings about how

pre-service teachers learn about teaching and learning by reflecting on their field experiences

with knowledgeable others.

Rationale

How does someone learn how to teach? On the surface, this question seems to be easily

answered in the following way: the education of pre-service teachers is traditionally marked by

the taking of coursework to learn content and pedagogy as well as engaging in field experiences

during which the preservice teachers observe certified teachers and practice teaching on their

own. It is assumed that what has been ‘learned’ in their coursework will transfer and inform the

actions they take during their field experiences and ultimately permeate their practice as certified

teachers.

However, recently there has been a shift away from the traditional approach to preparing

preservice teachers and toward a “move to programs that are fully grown in clinical practice and

interwoven with academic content and professional courses” (National Council for Accreditation

of Teacher Education, 2010, p. ii). As a result, a greater emphasis is being placed on the amount

of time preservice teachers spend engaging in field experiences. However, more practice in

classrooms does not necessarily equate with higher-quality experiences (Allsopp, DeMarie,

Alvarez-McHatton, & Doone, 2006).

6

Theory and Definitions

Herein lies a problem. If preservice teachers are expected to spend increased amounts of

time engaging in field experiences, how do those experiences help preservice teachers learn

about teaching and learning from a professional stance? In other words, how do preservice

teachers make meaning from the increased amount of field experiences in ways that inform their

future actions in the classroom and ultimately result in student learning? John Dewey (1933)

suggested that to make meaning from any experience one needs to reflect on it. Reflection, as

defined by Dewey, is a mode of thinking that is akin to inquiry. Reflection is defined by one’s

ability “to look back over what has been done so as to extract the net meanings which are the

capital stock for intelligent dealing with future experiences” (Dewey 1938, p.110). For Dewey,

the reflective act includes five phases. Although the description below may appear linear, a

person can, and often does, fluctuate between phases during reflection. In the pre-reflective

phase, one has an experience in which dissonance is felt. Thinking then turns to reflection as the

person experiences the following:

(1) suggestions, in which the mind leaps forward to a possible solution;

(2) an intellectualization of the difficulty or perplexity that has been felt

(directly experienced) into a problem to be solved, a question for

which the answer must be sought;

(3) the use of one suggestion after another as a leading idea, or hypothesis,

to initiate and guide observation and other operations in collection of

factual material;

(4) the mental elaboration of the idea or supposition as an idea or

supposition (reasoning, in the sense in which reasoning is a part, not

7

the whole, of inference); and (5) testing the hypothesis by overt or

imaginative action.

(Dewey, 1933, p.107).

Dewey’s writings seem to suggest that if preservice teachers reflect on their field

experiences they will learn about teaching and learning in meaningful ways which will then

inform their future actions in the classroom.

Indeed, reflection has been a key component of many teacher preparation programs and

has been researched widely. I detail the literature on reflection in Chapter Two of this

dissertation but I will briefly outline the most common approaches used to study reflection here.

Researchers examine the levels of reflection preservice teachers achieve as they use memory to

think about a field experience and document their thinking in journal entries (Cohen-Sayag &

Fischl, 2012; Seban, 2009), portfolios (Chetcuti, 2007), and papers (Alger, 2006; Seban, 2009).

Researchers also document the levels of reflection achieved by preservice teachers as they use

video of their own teaching as the text on which to reflect (Rosaen, Lundenburg, Cooper, Fritzen

& Terpstra, 2008). Some researchers examine reflection as it takes place in asynchronous on-line

spaces in conversations with peers and supervisors (Anderson & Matkins, 2001; Harland &

Wondra, 2011). Others, write about reflection as it occurs in synchronous environments, namely

in-person conversations with peers (Genor, 2005) or collaborating teachers (Ottenson, 2007).

Although researchers operationalize reflection in varying ways, reflection, as it is most

often researched, is conceived of as a static object- a thing created in isolation with a memory of

an experience or a video of an experience. The reflective journal entry (Seban, 2009), the critical

incident paper (Hamlin, 2004), the reflective paper written after editing video of teaching (Rosaen

et al. 2008), are all seen by researchers as reflection and are studied as such. I disagree. I argue

8

that reflection is better conceived of as a verb. It is the “active, persistent, and careful

consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that

support it and the further conclusions to which it tends” (Dewey, 1933, p. 9). Therefore, in my

proposed study, I operationalize reflection as a process (Branscombe & Schneider, 2013). I wish

to understand differently the experience preservice teachers have of the process of reflection

rather than the objects of reflection.

When I write that reflection is a process, I include key elements and concepts

theoretically associated with reflection to be part of that process. First, I believe reflection is

begun by an authentic feeling of dissonance. I operationalize dissonance as a misalignment of

one’s beliefs, thoughts, words, and actions. For example, in an experience, one would feel

dissonance when what they are doing (action, words) is different than what they believe they

should be doing (beliefs, thoughts). But there is more to dissonance than an experience of

misalignment. Cognitive dissonance, a theory created by Festinger (1957) has received much

attention by social psychologists over the years. Findings within that body of literature include

the idea that a lack of choice prevents dissonance from occurring (Zanna & Copper, 1974), in

high-choice situations, dissonance is experienced only if adverse consequences occur (Linder,

Copper & Jones, 1967), dissonance occurs when a person believes they are responsible for the

adverse consequence (Cooper, 2007), dissonance is experienced as discomfort (Elliot & Divine,

1994), and because of this discomfort, the human tendency is to justify ones actions that resulted

in the misalignment.

I believe these findings have great relevance to the process of reflection. Dissonance is

the impetus for reflection. As Dewey explained (1933), once dissonance is felt, then thinking can

turn to reflection. However, considering the findings mentioned above, I can imagine how a

9

preservice teacher would need help in recognizing his or her responsibility in creating the

‘adverse consequences’ that inevitably occur when learning to teach. I can see how assistance is

needed to even recognize that an adverse consequence did occur. And as dissonance is

uncomfortable, I can see how a knowledgeable other is needed to ‘stay with’ the dissonance and

discomfort long enough to break the cycle of merely justifying our behaviors rather than creating

new and rich understandings about teaching and learning from our experiences. As such, I

emphasize dissonance as an aspect of the process of reflection, an aspect which appears not to

have received attention in the empirical literature on reflection.

Many studies operationalize reflection as an object that is created as a result of a

preservice teacher thinking in isolation. My thinking differs. I believe that to reflect in isolation

recreates and cements one’s currently held beliefs rather than creating new meanings and

possibilities from experience. For preservice teachers, reflecting in isolation often means relying

on their ‘apprenticeship of observation’ (Lortie, 1975) which includes the numerous experiences

with teaching and learning they have had as students themselves. I argue that the knowledge

about teaching and learning from their ‘apprenticeship of observation’ or observation of others is

not adequate for making “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1933) about teaching and learning

as presented in scene one of this introduction. Nor is it sufficient for learning about teaching

from a professional stance.

I believe that in order to make “warranted assertabilities” from field experiences,

dialectic interaction with a knowledgable other (Vygotsky, 1978) is needed. A knowledgable

other creates spaces in which the preservice teacher mediates the old, that which is too familiar

to be the impetus for dissonance, and new, that which is too unfamiliar to be noticed. I

operationalize the role of ‘knowledgable other’ as a member of the teaching community of

10

practice (theory/research about teaching and learning, collaborating teacher, university

supervisor) who draws from her/his experience and theoretical understandings to create

dissonance and guide the pre-service teacher in the reflection process as she/he constructs

meaning from the field experience.

The need for interaction with a knowledgable other also stems from Dewey’s (1933)

writings about the roles judgment and analysis/synthesis play in the reflective process. Part of

reflecting on experiences is using previously constructed theory to select or reject the pertinent

aspects of an experience. These judgments or discernment play a critical role in knowing, as

Dewey writes, “… what to let go as of no account; what to eliminate as irrelevant; what to retain

as conducive to the outcome; what to emphasize as a clew to the difficulty” (p. 123). The

knowledgeable other can provide support and guidance as the pre-service teacher reflects on her

field experiences by using her/his previously constructed theories to help discern on which

aspects of an experience emphasis needs to be placed.

Intimately related to judgment is analysis and synthesis. For Dewey, these are not

considered dichotomous concepts. Analysis means to place emphasis on certain aspects of an

experience rather than ‘to take apart’ an experience. Synthesis is conceived of as putting into

context (relating back to the whole) that which emphasis was placed (Dewey, 1933, p.129). In

other words, in order to construct theory from practice, we must be able to engage in reflection

by making judgments that allow us to both accept and reject, analyze and synthesize, our

experiences. Again, it is the role of the knowledgeable other to assist the pre-service teacher

during reflection by placing emphasis on certain aspects of experience and helping, through the

use of theories, to create dialectic tension. The knowledgeable other engages in dialectic

11

discourse with the pre-service teacher about that which emphasis was placed concomitantly with

maintaining an awareness of how that which emphasis was placed relates to the whole.

My beliefs about reflection also come from my own experiences and reflections on

reflection. Knowledgeable others who have supported my own reflection include the writings of

Dewey, Gadamer, Heidegger, mentors, and colleagues. It is through dialectic tension with these

knowledgable others that I make “warranted assertabilities” and gain new insights from my

experiences reflecting with preservice teachers that I use to inform my future actions.

I distinguish dialectic tension from dialogic interaction. I draw from the rich

philosophical history of dialectics as a means by which exploring opposing concepts help to

inquire into contradictions and solutions. In particular, I align myself with the Hegelian concept

of dialectics as the process of thought by which apparent contradictions are seen to be part of a

higher truth. Dialogic interaction on the other hand can refer to any interaction during which

people are taking turns speaking or writing. And it is dialogic interaction that has been studied by

researchers (Lee, 2004; Sharma, Phillion & Malewski, 2011; Shoffner, 2008) rather than

dialectic tension. I argue that it is the tension brought about through dialectic engagement with

experience that plays a central role in the process of reflection. Merely taking turns talking about

an experience with a knowledgeable other, will most likely not create new understandings.

Therefore, I wish to come to understand a preservice teachers’ experience of dialectic tension

with a knowledgeable other.

To view reflection (1) as a process, (2) as spawned by a feeling of dissonance, (3) as

needing support from a ‘knowledgeable other’, and (4) as present during dialectic tension,

complicates things. It certainly makes researching reflection a complex and challenging

enterprise. However, it is a challenge I wish to undertake.

12

Overview of Study

In my research, I seek to understand and see anew the idea of reflection as it is

experienced by a pre-service teacher with whom I work. I engage in an hermeneutic

phenomenology (Gadamer, 1976; Van Manen, 1990), to deepen my understanding of reflection

as process as it is experienced by a preservice teacher. In this study, I ask the following question:

What is the experience of video-mediated, dialectic reflection with a knowledgeable other for the

preservice teacher with whom I work?

In the following chapters, I engage with the concept of reflection. First, in chapter two I

review the literature on reflection in pre-service teacher education. Chapter two is set up to be a

self-contained manuscript. In chapter three I detail the context, methodology and methods I used

to engage in this research. Then in chapter four, titled Understandings, I present three

hermeneutic windows (Sumara, 1996) through which to view reflection. Finally, in chapter five I

discuss the possible implications this work has for teacher education.

I end this introduction by revisiting Dewey’s quote about education. What if learning to

teach is “a process of living”, rather than a “preparation for future living?” It seems then that part

of the process would include thinking (specifically reflecting) and being. I believe engaging with

reflection in the above mentioned way may open new possibilities for thinking about reflection

and the ways preservice teachers make “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) from

their field experiences.

13

Chapter Two

Examining the Theoretical Assumptions Which Undergird Research in the

Reflective Practices of Pre-service Teachers

Abstract

Over a decade ago, Roskos, Vukelich, and Risko (2001) reviewed the literature on

reflection and learning to teach. They concluded that researchers defined reflection in a number

of ways which led to a focus on descriptions of reflection rather than analyzing and interpreting

data in ways that built an evidentiary base. In this critical review, I examine the literature on

reflection and pre-service teacher education since the publication of the Roskos et al. (2001)

review with an emphasis on how researchers define reflection and to what extent those

definitions resonate with Dewey’s (1933, 1938) theoretical writings about reflection. I reviewed

42 empirical studies. Through deductive analysis and hermeneutic (Gadamer, 1976) engagement

with these texts, I found that researchers primarily define reflection as thinking about a past

experience rather than a specific mode of thought, prompted by dissonance in experience, which

creates “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) about teaching and learning. I present

that perhaps much of the empirical literature researchers have created so far in the name of

reflection has pointed toward reflection but seems to not have worked with the complexities of

reflection as a communal process (Branscombe & Schneider, 2013) which involves judgment,

dissonance, and dialectic tension (Dewey, 1933).

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Introduction

With recent calls for teacher education programs to increase both the quantity and quality

of field experiences (NCATE, 2010), it is important for teacher educators to understand how pre-

service teachers create meaning from those experiences. Reflection is a mode of thought

historically associated with creating “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) from

experience. As such, a common component of teacher education programs is reflection

(Richardson, 1990; Darling-Hammond, 2010) and pre-service teachers are often asked or

required to reflect on their field experiences (Calandra, Brabtley-Dias, Lee, & Fox, 2009). With

support from Schon’s (1983) groundbreaking work, reflection is lauded as the means by which

pre-service teachers become problem-solvers and meet the intellectual challenges of the

classroom (Quinn, Pultorak, Young, and McCarthy, 2010). However, reflection remains an

“ambiguous and contentious construct” (Collin, Karsenti, and Komis, 2012, p. 104).

Indeed a prior review (Roskos, Vukelich & Risco, 2001) points to the body of

empirical literature on reflection and pre-service teachers as,

lacking studies with complex and creative designs which employ theoretical

and analytical perspectives that can illuminate the joint interactive effects of

individual propensities and environmental factors on reflection development in the

professional setting (p.619).

In the above mentioned review, Roskos et al. (2001) analyzed/interpreted 54 empirical

reflection studies. They made five major interpretive observations of the literature under review:

(1) researchers focused on descriptions of reflection rather than analyzing and interpreting data

in ways that built “an evidentiary base” (p. 613), (2) the research on reflection occurred in the

later years of the pre-service teachers’ education and so little is known about the development of

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reflection; (3) researchers defined reflection in a number of ways; (4) researchers struggled with

the simultaneity of the “person-environment dynamic” (p. 614); and (5) there was an apparent

lack of historical continuity among studies. That is to say few studies built upon each other and

they did not use multiple theoretical frames to create a movement in understanding.

I view Roskos at al’s. (2001) third interpretive statement as central to the ambiguity that

is associated with the word reflection in pre-service teacher education. Although the authors

pointed to the multiple ways researchers defined reflection they did not explicate to what extent

those definitions resonated with theories of reflection or how the researchers’ definitions of

reflection impacted the designs of the studies which in turn impacted whether or not reflection

occurred. Therefore, in this critical review, I consider the relationship between researchers’

multiple definitions of reflection and their analysis and interpretative statements about reflection.

I juxtapose the findings of empirical studies conducted after 2001 with theoretical writings about

reflection in an effort to create new understandings about the complexities of studying reflection.

I also examine the theoretical assumptions present in the literature on reflection in pre-service

teacher education and through dialectic tension, I illuminate the difficulties of studying reflection

and, through those difficulties, the possibilities of exploring reflection in its complexity.

Reflection: Current Understandings

In order to create meaning from the multiple studies and theoretical writings in this

review, I drew from my current understandings of reflection, my prejudices (Gadamer, 1976).

Prejudices in the hermeneutical sense are not “unjustified and erroneous so that they inevitably

distort the truth” (p.9). Rather, prejudices are precisely what allows us to experience the world. I

used my prejudices about reflection to enter into conversation with these texts about reflection

with the intention of wanting to hear something new. My current understandings of reflection are

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based upon both theoretical writings and my extensive personal engagement with reflection and

pre-service teachers. Below I detail the ideas with which I entered this review.

I understand reflection to have its roots firmly planted in Cartesian philosophy (Fendler,

2003). Descartes (1596-1650) outlined how knowledge is created. In his work, Rules for the

Direction of Mind (in Great Books of the Western World, 1952, volume 31), Descartes made the

claim that one does not need to look outside oneself to intuit truth and as such create knowledge.

For Descartes, to be self aware (to be both the subject who is thinking and the object of which

the self is thinking) is to create knowledge. Fendler shared that “Reflection, in its common

Cartesian meaning, rests on the assumption that self-awareness can generate valid knowledge.

When epistemology rests on reflection, it is not necessary to appeal to divine revelation or to a

higher authority for knowledge” (2003, p. 17). In this way, one breaks from tradition (as if this

were possible) and relies on the self to create knowledge. The idea that from one’s own thinking

one can create valid knowledge informs how reflection is often operationalized in teacher

education-- especially when pre-service teachers are required or asked to reflect in isolation

(Delandshere & Arens, 2003; Wunder, 2003). The studies I summarize and synthesize later in

this paper reveal the remnants of Cartesian thinking in regard to reflection, which, I will argue,

make problematic the transformative potential of reflection as a mode of thought which brings

about “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) and understanding.

In contrast to a Cartesian notion of reflection as self-awareness, Dewey (1933), views

reflection as a communal activity. The contrast between Cartesian knowledge and Dewey’s

thinking about knowledge can be illustrated in the following quote: “Human knowing is a

communal activity [for Dewey], not a solitary achievement” (Campbell, DaWaal, Hart, et al.

2008, p. 192). Therefore, asking a pre-service teacher to think, in isolation, about a field

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experience in an attempt to generate knowledge about teaching and learning is aligned with a

Cartesian view of knowledge construction. However, Dewey (1933) makes an important

distinction between thinking and reflecting. Although they are often used interchangeably, there

are significant differences between the two. Thinking is aligned with thoughts and feelings,

impulses. Dewey (1933) writes,

Hence it is that he [sic] who offers ‘a penny for your thoughts’ does not expect to drive

any great bargain if his offer is taken; he will only find out what happens to be ‘going through

the mind’ and what ‘goes’ in this fashion rarely leaves much that is worth while behind. (p.4)

Thinking is comprised of the myriad of images and “uncontrolled coursing of ideas”

(Dewey, 1933, p.4) that populate our minds. Reflection is different. Reflection is the

Active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of

knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further conclusions to

which it tends (Dewey, 1933, p.9)

Pre-service teachers can think about their field experiences and create their own meaning

from those experiences but does this result in “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938.p.15)

about teaching and learning?

Reflection thus implies that something is believed in (or disbelieved in), not on its own

direct account, but through something else which stands as witness, evidence, proof, voucher,

warrant; that is as ground of belief. (Dewey, 1933, p.11)

One can think about a field experience in isolation but in order to reflect on a field

experience in an attempt to create “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) about teaching

and learning, one needs to engage in the communal activity of interacting with knowledgeable

others, be it theories about teaching and learning and/or people within the community of practice

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(Wenger, 1998) of teaching. When reading the literature for this review I searched for evidence

of how the researcher(s) viewed reflection as a communal activity and how researchers defined

reflection and the extent to which reflection was differentiated from thinking.

If reflection is a communal activity, then reflection is not a series of one’s individual

thoughts; rather, I understand reflection to be a process (Branscombe & Schneider, 2013) of

skillful meaning construction carried out in concert with others. Dewey (1933) wrote about the

process of reflection. First, one must have an experience in which dissonance is felt followed by

an immediate interpretation of the experience. Without dissonance, one would not be compelled

to engage in reflective thought, rather one would continue on with what they were doing without

creating new understandings. After this initial responsive thinking, one names the problem

associated with the experience and generates possible explanations. From these possibilities an

hypothesis is formed. The final phase in the reflective act occurs when hypotheses are tested.

When engaging with the literature for this review I was attuned to the elements of the process of

reflection in which the pre-service teachers were engaged.

For Dewey (1934), it is not just any experience that initiates a moment which is ripe to

reflect upon. The experience needs to be one in which there is a confrontation with the

environment or when personal values conflict. It is this dissonance that is the impetus of

reflective thinking. Dewey writes,

The live creature demands order in his living but he also demands novelty. Confusion is

displeasing but so is ennui. The “touch of disorder” that lends charm to a regular scene is

disorderly only from some external standard. From the standpoint of actual experience it adds

emphasis, distinction, as long as it does not prevent a cumulative carrying forward from one part

to another. If it were experienced as disorder it would produce an unresolved clash and be

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displeasing. A temporary clash, on the other hand, may be the factor of resistance that summons

up energy to proceed more actively and triumphantly. (p. 173)

The above quote emphasizes the importance of the dissonance felt to be neither too minor

so as not to be registered nor too major so as to constitute disorder. When pre-service teachers

are asked to reflect on their field experiences it is important to consider how they are or are not

experiencing dissonance within those experiences.

As dissonance is the impetus for reflection, I paid particular attention to the role

dissonance played in the studies I reviewed. I drew upon the following ideas from the literature

on dissonance: (1) a lack of choice prevents dissonance from occurring (Zanna & Cooper, 1974),

(2) in high-choice situations, dissonance is experienced only if adverse consequences occur

(Linder, Cooper & Jones, 1967), (3) dissonance occurs when a person believes they are

responsible for the adverse consequence (Cooper, 2007), and (4) dissonance is experienced as

discomfort (Elliot & Divine, 1994), and because of this discomfort, the human tendency is to

justify ones actions that resulted in the dissonance rather than change their beliefs in a way that

would ‘generate fruitful and testable hypotheses’. As I analyzed the studies included in this

review I used the above understandings of dissonance to discern to what extent dissonance

played a role in the process of reflection the pre-service teachers underwent.

When attending to the process of reflection as described by Dewey, I searched for

additional factors that impact reflection such as judgment. An aspect of reflecting on experiences

is using previously constructed theory to select or reject the pertinent aspects of an experience.

These judgments or discernment play a critical role in knowing, as Dewey writes, “… what to let

go as of no account; what to eliminate as irrelevant; what to retain as conducive to the outcome;

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what to emphasize as a clew1 to the difficulty” (p. 123). Judgment presupposes background

knowledge. In the case of pre-service teachers, judgment presupposes knowledge about teaching

and learning. Both the reading and writing literature (Duke & Pearson, 2002; Hidi & Boscolo,

2006) make important and establish a relationship between the content knowledge possessed by

the reader and/or writer and the impact that content knowledge has on the comprehension of

and/or development of ideas within a text (that which the pre-service teacher is reflecting upon

and/or constructing through reflection). When analyzing studies in this review I searched for the

role judgment played in the pre-service teachers’ process of reflection.

Based on my personal experience working closely with pre-service teachers as they

reflect on their field experiences, I believe a knowledgeable other (Vygotsky, 1978) in contrast to

a Cartesian other, is needed to provide support throughout the rigorous process of reflection.

Namely, support is needed to assist the pre-service teacher in judging or discerning the pertinent

aspects of an experience to consider. According to Dewey, making meaning of experiences must

include a balance of new and old. New, meaning something strange or curious about a situation

that causes us to refer to old, or familiar, ideas to make sense of the new. This can be problematic

for pre-service teachers as teaching and learning can appear ‘old’ to them as they rely on their

apprenticeship of observation (Lortie, 1975) and false sense of expertise from years of being

students themselves (Britzman, 2003) to interpret their field experiences. Dewey (1933) writes,

...unless the familiar are presented under conditions that are in some respect

unusual, there is no jog to thinking; no demand is made upon the hunting out

something new and different. And if the subject presented is totally strange, there is

1 Dewey’s spelling of clue

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no basis upon which it may suggest anything serviceable for its comprehension (p.

290).

It is the role of the knowledgeable other to attend to this aspect of reflection during

conversations with the pre-service teacher. The knowledgeable other seeks to emphasize those

aspects of an experience which may seem familiar to the pre-service teacher because of her

apprenticeship of observation by speaking about them in ways that may be unusual as to jog

thinking. Likewise, the knowledgeable other may emphasize that which may seem utterly strange

to the pre-service teacher in a manner that connects the aspect of experience to something that is

familiar and so jogs thinking. As such, I carefully examined the role knowledgeable others did or

did not play in the process of reflection.

Additionally, support of knowledgeable others is needed to assist the pre-service teacher

to ‘stay with’ the uncomfortable experience of dissonance long enough and skillfully enough to

form professional understandings about teaching and learning. And so I examined the degree to

which dialectic tension was present in the process of reflection for the pre-service teachers in the

studies I reviewed. I distinguish dialectic tension from dialogic interaction. I draw from the rich

philosophical history of dialectics as a means by which exploring opposing concepts help to

inquire into contradictions and solutions. Dialogic interaction on the other hand can refer to any

interaction during which people are taking turns speaking or writing.

It is also important to note that many leveling and typifying schemes have been created as

ways to measure and/or describe the products (journal entries, transcripts of conversations, etc.)

that result from perceived reflection. Many researchers (Van Manen, 1977; Zeichner & Liston,

1987; Sparks-Langer, Simmons, Ellwein, Graue & Comfort,1990; Meizrow, 1991; Kitchner &

King, 1981; Hatton & Smith, 1995) have written about ways to categorize the levels of reflection

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produced by pre-service teachers (see Appendix A for a list of their corresponding levels).

Although the leveling schemes differ, they follow a common pattern of low levels of reflection

being considered those in which the pre-service teacher merely describes an experience to high

levels of reflection as those in which the pre-service teacher considers the moral and ethical

dimensions of her/his experiences. Although most researchers rely on using these schemes to

measure and describe the artifacts of perceived reflection in their studies, based on my

theoretical understanding of reflection primarily informed by Dewey (1933, 1938), I question

whether reflection can be leveled. For example, a low level of reflection is characterized by a

mere description of an event but as Dewey (1933) notes, a mere description is not reflecting; a

mere description is not creating “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) about teaching

and learning. Likewise, when a pre-service teacher considers the moral and ethical dimensions of

her/his work, a characteristic associated with high levels of reflection, she/he is not necessarily

creating “warranted assertabilities” about those dimensions either. She/he could merely be

sharing their thoughts and feelings not necessarily reflecting. In this review, I report the findings

of the studies as the researchers reported (primarily in levels). However, I discuss how focusing

on perceived levels of reflection may be moving researchers away from understanding reflection

and toward leveling thinking not reflection.

To summarize, I approached this review with the following current understandings of

reflection: (1) reflection is a communal activity, (2) reflection is different from thinking, (3) it is

a process in which dissonance and judgment play key roles, (4) and a knowledgeable other is

needed to assist the preservice teacher as they ‘stay with’ the dissonance throughout the process

in order to create the dialectic tension necessary to develop new understandings.

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Methods

Research Questions

This review was guided by the following questions: (1) In what ways do researchers

define reflection in studies published after the Roskos et al. (2001) review? (2) What relationship

exists between researchers’ multiple definitions of reflection and their analysis and interpretative

statements about reflection? (3) What new understandings can be created when the findings of

these studies are juxtaposed with multiple theoretical writings about reflection? (4) What insights

can be gained into the complexities of studying reflection through engagement with the

literature?

Inclusion Criteria

This review utilized both empirical and theoretical studies of reflection and pre-service

teacher education. Both types of research were needed to create the dialectic tension necessary to

create new understandings. Therefore, I used two separate inclusion criteria sets to obtain data

for this review. The following parameters were used for finding empirical studies: articles

needed to be published between 2001 and 2012; treat reflection as the central construct under

examination, and published in peer-reviewed journals. The inclusion criteria for theoretical

writings was less systematic. I drew from seminal works of which I was well aware (Dewey,

1933, 1934, 1938; Gadamer, 1976) as well as searched for theoretical writings from fields

(Cognitive Dissonance Theory) with which I was less familiar (Cooper, 2007). Additionally, any

theoretical papers that I found as a result of searching for the empirical studies were read and

considered as to their relevance for this study.

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Obtaining Data

After the inclusion criteria were developed, I conducted an electronic database search of

the Education Resources Information Center (ERIC), PsychINFO, JSTOR, and EBSCOhost

using search teams commonly used in the field of reflection and preservice teacher education

such as reflect, reflective practice, preservice, teacher preparation, etc. The electronic data base

search yielded 626 hits. Of those, 32 studies met the inclusion criteria. Next, I conducted an

electronic hand search by examining the tables of contents of teacher educator journals including

Journal of Teacher Education, Reflective Practice, Teaching and Teacher Education, and

Teachers College Record. The hand search yielded an additional 10 studies that met the

inclusion criteria. The total number of qualified studies equaled 42 (See Appendix B for a

summary).

Analyzing and Synthesizing: Creating New Understandings

I approached interpretation for this review in the hermeneutic tradition (Gadamer, 1976).

I chose this approach because hermeneutics is “primarily of use where making clear to others

and making clear to oneself has become blocked” (p.92). Because the term reflection is

ubiquitous in teacher education and because it is an “ambiguous and contentious construct”

(Collin et al., 2012, p. 104), I believed an hermeneutic approach held possibilities for creating

new and fresh understandings about this body of literature. Therefore, I engaged in analysis and

synthesis in the Deweyian sense. For Dewey (1933), analysis means to place emphasis on certain

aspects of an experience rather than the traditional meaning ‘to take apart.’ Synthesis is

conceived of as putting into context (relating back to the whole) that on which emphasis was

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placed (Dewey, 1933, p.129). In this way, I attended to both the parts (individual writings) and

the whole (the collection of work) simultaneously. I entered the hermeneutic circle (Gadamer,

1977). What I understood about the parts informed my understanding of the whole which in turn

colored my understanding of the parts.

To further explain my process, first, I read all of the empirical studies holistically to get a

‘feel’ for the body of work. Then I analyzed the data through a deductive process. I read the

studies to determine how the researcher(s) defined reflection, namely to what extent reflection in

the study was operationalized as a communal activity. Then I looked for what the pre-service

teachers were required or asked to reflect upon (e.g., memory of field experience, video of

teaching, etc.) and labeled them accordingly. Next, I reread the articles to determine what

medium the pre-service teachers were asked to use as a means to aid in the process of reflection

(e.g., journal, blog, etc). I then reread the articles and summarized the key findings on an article

summary chart (See Appendix B). Next, I examined each article with a critical eye to determine

what roles dissonance, judgment, knowledgeable others, and dialectic tension played in the

studies. I made notes about these concepts as they related to each study on the front page of each

article and labeled them with sticky notes accordingly. As I was reading the studies, I entered

into conversation with each one and questions came to mind. As questions arose, I added them to

the article summary chart in a separate column (Appendix B). In Appendix C, I gathered

excerpts of selected studies which demonstrated to what extent the researcher(s) attended to the

four significant aspects of reflection (dissonance, judgment, knowledgeable others, and dialectic

tension). I then created a graphic representation (see Appendix D) of the categories and sub-

categories I created from the empirical studies. Appendix D shows the two broad categories

(reflection as a non-communal activity and reflection as a communal activity) based on how the

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researcher(s) defined reflection. The sub-categories indicate how the design of the studies

provided support through the mediums used during the process of reflection. For example, the

left hand side of Appendix D represents those studies in which the pre-service teachers were

asked or required to reflect by writing about a memory of a field experience or a video of their

field experience in isolation. Some of these studies provided no support as the pre-service

teachers engaged in free-topic journal writing while others provided support in the form of

prompts, guiding questions, and/or video to stimulate thinking. The right hand side of the graphic

organizer shows studies in which reflection was operationalized as a communal activity, in the

form of dialogic interaction with others. While other researchers created asynchronous

environments in which the pre-service teachers were asked or required to reflect with peers

and/or instructors. Other researchers created synchronous environments such as conversations

with peers and/or instructors. I use Appendix D as the guide to the presentation of my

interpretations below.

Throughout this process, I continued to read theoretical articles and seminal pieces. I

made note of salient ideas by underlining and marking with sticky notes. I did not summarize

these pieces but rather allowed those ideas to enter into the conversation I was having with the

empirical work. For example, when researchers defined reflection as writing in isolation about a

memory of a field experience and then leveled the writing and reported mostly low levels of

reflection (description of experience), I questioned whether or not the pre-service teachers

reflected at all. So, I revisited Dewey’s writings (1933, 1934, 1938). I was reminded of the

distinction between thinking and reflecting. I went back to the empirical work and reread the

articles with this distinction in mind and thought of the possibility that perhaps what is being

leveled are the products of thinking rather than reflection. This then spawned the question in my

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mind, are there levels of reflection? I revisited Dewey’s writings again for clues to this question.

This dialectic thought process occurred throughout this study. As new ideas and insights were

created I wrote about them in the interpretation and discussion section of this paper. And the

writing process helped to refine those ideas and make clear to myself and others the complexities

of and possibilities for studying reflection.

Interpretations and Discussion: New Insights into Studying Reflection

I have organized the understandings I have created from this review into two broad

categories based on the extent to which the researchers’ viewed reflection as communal activity.

The first broad category is reflection as non-communal activity. The second broad category is

reflection as communal activity. A graphic representation of these categories and the additional

sub-categories can be found in Appendix D. After providing brief descriptions of the studies and

the primary findings, I share insights I created as a result of the dialectic tension between the

researchers’ definition of reflection, the design of the study, the findings of the studies, and

theoretical writings about reflection. As hermeneutic interpretation is circular in nature, the

reader may find it helpful to consult the graphic representation of findings (Appendix D) as

she/he engages with this section of the paper.

Reflection as Non-Communal Activity

Within the literature, pre-service teachers are often required or asked to reflect in

isolation on their memory of particular field experiences in the medium of writing. Some

researchers require pre-service teachers to reflect in isolation with no guidance (Delandshere &

Arens, 2003; Wunder, 2003) or in isolation with various support structures in place such as

prompts and guiding questions (Chamoso & Caceres, 2008; Hamlin, 2004; Rodman, 2010).

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In isolation without support structures. Studies in which pre-service teachers are asked

to reflect in isolation without support structures show pre-service teachers primarily engaged in

low levels of reflection as measured by the respective researchers. For example, Wunder (2003)

analyzed 21 pre-service teachers’ reflective essays which were written without the support of a

prompt and found all 21 essays incorporated ideas related to ‘classroom management’ and

‘student involvement’ while only three essays included ideas about ‘purposes of social studies.’

Reporting similar findings, Delandshire & Arens (2003) examined three teacher education

programs that use portfolios as a medium of reflection and found the reflections present in the

portfolios to be “typically brief summaries of events that happened during the lesson with

conclusions about the success of the lesson” (p. 67), which is commonly considered a low level

of reflection.

These studies raise important issues about whether reflection occurred or not considering

that a brief summary is, according to Dewey (1933), not reflection but thinking. Also, a pre-

service teacher could reflect and create “warranted assertabilities” about classroom management

and student involvement. A focus on these topics does not necessarily preclude understandings

about teaching and learning. I believe understanding how a student’s involvement impacts

her/his learning is an important idea and is a line of thinking that could lead to the pre-service

teacher forming “warranted assertabilities” about the complex relationships between their

actions, management of materials and time, student involvement, and student learning. However,

because the design of these studies did not attend to dissonance, judgment, knowledgeable

others, or dialectic tension, it is doubtful that the pre-service teachers engaged in reflection and

created “warranted assertabilities” about these dimensions of teaching.

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In isolation with support structures. Comparison studies (Dawson, 2006; Tsang, 2003;

Hamlin 2004) create evidence which suggests pre-service teachers engage in perceived higher

levels of reflection when support structures are in place. Tsang (2003) compared the levels of

reflection demonstrated by the journal entries of the pre-service teachers with whom she worked.

In the free topic journal entries, pre-service teachers primarily wrote about evaluating their own

teaching while the ideas expressed in the assigned topic entries were focused on theories of

teaching. But does a focus on theories and learning equate to creating “warranted assertabilities”

about teaching and learning that will guide the pre-service teachers’ future actions? One can

write about theories of teaching without engaging in the reflective process and creating a

warranted assertability from their experience. Similarly, Hamlin (2004) found that the use of a

structured critical incident paper supported higher levels of reflection than a free topic journal

assignment which resulted in low levels of reflection. Perhaps the perceived higher levels of

reflection in this study were related to the presence of dissonance within the critical incident.

However, it is still unclear as to whether the critical incident paper contained thinking about the

incident or the rigorous process of creating “warranted assertabilities”, i.e. reflecting about the

incident. Dawson (2006) conducted a comparison study of traditional reflective strategies

(journal entries) vs. inquiry project as reflective strategy and the effects each had on pre-service

teachers’ reflection. She found that reflections in traditional, weekly journal entries were

pervasively related to logistics and pre-service teachers struggled to keep a focus on curriculum

and how their technology integration was influencing student learning. In contrast, the inquiry

project resulted in a focus on student learning, an exploration of the complexities involved in

technology integration, and attention to contextual factors. Perhaps the structure of the inquiry

project attended to the aspect of knowledgeable others as the pre-service teachers were required

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to consult theories from their coursework. However, the question remains, does a focus on

student learning and an exploration of complexities amount to reflection?

In addition to the comparison studies mentioned above, many researchers examined the

effects support structures have on the levels of reflection pre-service teachers achieved through

writing about memories of field experiences and report positive findings. Chitpin (2006) found

that using a framework for knowledge building as a support structure for pre-service teachers’

journal writing resulted in increased levels of reflection over time. Are levels indicative of

reflection? Samuels & Betts (2007) used a self- assessment tool with pre-service teachers to help

guide their journal entries and found levels of reflection increasing over time although not

reaching the highest levels. Additionally, Rodman (2010) reported pre-service teachers’

reflections moving along a continuum of teacher centered to student centered as pre-service

teachers used a framework for writing about their field experiences. Does a focus on the student

rather than the teacher imply reflection? I view creating “warrented assertabilities” about the

complex relationships which exist between teacher, student, communities, etc. to be a goal

toward which reflection tends.

However, not all researchers report such increased levels of reflection even when support

structures are present. For example, El-Dib (2007) examined the effect action research has on

levels of reflection achieved by pre-service teachers. El-Dib reported more than 95% of the

participants were at the low to low-intermediate levels of reflection. Again, is this reflection if

low levels are considered description and could reflection have occurred without dissonance and

the assistance of a knowledgeable other? Griffin (2003) taught the pre-service teachers with

whom she worked how to critically reflect and then measured their levels of reflection as

evidenced in critical incident papers. She found 87% of the incidents displayed low-levels of

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reflection. Chitpin, Simon and Galipeau (2008) provided a framework for pre-service teachers to

use as they relied on their memory to reflect on field experiences and found 24 out of 27 teachers

focused on classroom management issues and offered strategies instead of theories without

providing a basis for such strategy use (content typically associated with low levels of

reflection). It seems as though when left to think about their field experiences in isolation, pre-

service teachers rely on naming strategies they have seen either from their own schooling or the

examples provided by their collaborating teacher when they think about problems in the

classroom.

Just as K12 classroom teaching occurs through interaction, it would take a

knowledgeable other to create dialectic tension by asking questions that would provoke

dissonance and impel reflection. To this end, Nagle (2009) analyzed the contents of the guided

portfolio entries of nine pre-service teachers and found 67% engaged in factual and procedural

levels of reflection and 33% engaged in justificatory and critical reflection. Liakopoulou (2012)

required pre-service teachers to use a reflection tool to guide their writing about their memory of

field experiences and found their reflection focused on specific topics and a reliance on

technocratic views of teaching. Chamoso and Caceres (2008) document 62% of participants

wrote descriptions of field experiences over 50% of the time. Likewise, Seban (2009) reports

little evidence of critical thought present in reflective papers written with the support of guiding

questions. I wonder if the support structure of guiding questions, although intended to focus the

pre-service teachers on pertinent aspects of their experience, does not provide the dialectic

tension that engagement with knowledgeable others can create to ‘stay with’ dissonance long

enough and skillfully enough to create “warranted assertabilities”.

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In isolation using the mediums of video and writing. In a comparison study Rosaen,

Lundenberg, Cooper, Fritzen and Terpstra (2008) demonstrated that the written reflections of

pre-service teachers who watched video of their own teaching were of higher quality than those

reflections written by the same teachers who relied on their memory of a teaching experience.

The researchers associated quality with an increase in statements about instruction. In other

words, when a preservice teacher wrote about the relation between themselves and instruction or

the relation between instruction and children the researchers considered those statements as

evidence of reflective thinking. I wonder though, does the presence of statements about

instruction, and relationships indicate thoughts or reflection? In another comparison study

(Calandra, Brantley-Dias, Lee & Fox 2009), researchers compared the reflections of two groups

of pre-service teachers. The first group debriefed after they taught a lesson using the medium of

conversation with their university supervisor and then wrote a critical incident paper. The other

group edited the video of their teaching to demonstrate two critical incidents and then reflected

on those incidents using the medium of writing. Findings show participants in the video editing

group wrote longer and more “pedagogically connected reflective pieces” (p.81) than the

memory based group.

With the findings of two comparative studies pointing to the potential of video to enhance

reflection, other researchers have examined specific uses of video. For example, Santagata and

Angelici (2010) compared the written reflections of two groups of pre-service teachers. Both

groups watched a video of an experienced teacher teaching a mathematics lesson and reflected

on the lesson without the aid of a framework to guide their analysis. Then, Group 1 used a

Lesson Analysis Framework to guide the pre-service teacher as they watched video again. Group

2 watched the same video a second time but applied a different framework. The researchers

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reported that the reflections produced in Group 1 after the application of the Lesson Analysis

Framework demonstrated higher-levels than those in group 2. It seems as though the design of

this study included assisting the pre-service teachers with judgment. The framework helped the

pre-service teacher place emphasis on the pertinent aspects of the lesson. However, given the

way perceived reflection is leveled it is unclear as to whether these pre-service teachers created

“warranted assertabilites” about this teaching incident that would be helpful to them in their

future actions.

In another study (Yesilbura, 2011), a group of pre-service teachers were asked to reflect

in isolation on a video of themselves teaching a micro-lesson. They were required to use the

medium of writing as they reflected. The researcher reports the 67.45% of the time the reflection

were centered on themselves, 17.68% of the time their reflections were focused on the students

and teaching partners, 9.86% of the reflections were about the task at hand and 5.01% were on

both past and future experiences. These topics are traditionally associated with low levels of

reflection but as I noted earlier, in theory, one can reflect on any topic. The topic of reflection

does not preclude or guarantee the process.

It is concerning that a number of researchers report low levels of reflection despite the

presence of support structures given the evidence provided in a mixed methods research design

examining the link between levels of reflective writing and pre-service teachers’ success in

teaching (Cohen-Sayag & Fischl, 2012). In this study, the researchers examined the reflective

statements found in two groups of pre-service teachers’ journal entries and the relationship

between levels of reflective statements and quality of teaching as evidenced by the university

supervisors’ evaluation using an evaluation tool. One group of fifteen pre-service teachers (A)

worked with students who had ‘multiple and profound disabilities’ and the other group of nine

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pre-service teachers (B) worked with students who had ‘learning difficulties’. Data showed both

groups’ journal entires included statements primarily associated with descriptive, low-levels of

reflection. The statements in the journal entries of group A increased in reflective levels over the

course of the year but very few (8.94%) reached the highest, critical level of reflection. The level

of reflective statements in group B also increased but few (15.4%) reached critical levels. A

paired Pearson correlation test indicated that only those who increased their written levels of

reflection to the critical level, increased their quality of teaching. This evidence suggests that

increased levels of reflection does not necessarily equate to increased quality of teaching unless

those levels reach the critical level. When this study is juxtaposed with Dewey’s (1933)

distinction between thinking and reflecting, as well as with what I understand about leveling

schemes, it is not surprising that only the highest level of reflection is correlated with quality of

teaching because the lower and intermediate levels as described by researchers are theoretically

merely thinking, not reflecting. And reflecting is what creates “warranted assetabilities” that

guide future action. Although this study was quite small (N=24), other studies seem to suggest a

correlation between dispositions toward reflection and quality of teaching (Giovannelli, 2003)

and provide evidence of reflective practices impacting pre-service teachers’ beliefs about

teaching (Rideout & Koot, 2009).

But why does it appear that pre-service teachers predominantly engage in low to

moderate levels of reflection when relying on their memory of field experiences despite the

presence of support structures. There is evidence which suggests that pre-service teachers present

themselves in a positive light (Orland Barak, 2005), resent the feedback given to them in

response journals (Otienoh, 2010) and that they engage in inauthentic reflection to please the

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professor (Hobbs, 2007). But I think there is more to it than the idea that pre-service teachers are

capable of reflecting on their own but choose not to out of resentment or annoyance.

Perhaps new understandings can be created if we explore more thoroughly the theoretical

assumptions present in the design of these studies as a result of how the researchers

operationalized reflection. First, relying on memory of a field experience can be problematic. It is

well documented that discrepancies occur between memory and experience (Hsee & Hastle,

2006; Wirtz, Kruger, Scollon & Diener, 2003). There are many reasons that memories of

experience become distorted including “an over-reliance of memory on prominent instances,

thereby ignoring less noticeable events” (Miron-Shatz, Stone & Kahneman, 2009, p.886), and a

tendency to recall events more favorably than they actually occurred (Wirtz et al., 2003). Which

is why the addition of video as a tool to aid in the reflection process is important. Although video

does not ameliorate the aspect of judgment (i.e. a knowledgeable other is still needed to assist the

pre-service teacher in discerning which aspects of the experience are pertinent to the felt

dissonance) it does provide a text that can be revisited throughout the reflection process.

Secondly, although journal writing is lauded as a way for pre-service teachers to “identify

key aspects of their current situation” (O’Connell & Dyment, 2011) requiring a pre-service

teacher to reflect in isolation runs counter to theoretical understandings about the role judgment

plays in reflection. Even when support structures such as guiding questions and self-assessment

surveys are provided, the pre-service teacher is left to her/his own novice understandings of

teaching and learning in order to determine “… what to let go as of no account; what to eliminate

as irrelevant; what to retain as conducive to the outcome; what to emphasize as a clew to the

difficulty” (Dewey, 1933, p. 123). When left to determine importance of a field experience on

their own it is commonly understood that pre-service teachers rely on their understandings about

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teaching and learning largely created from their ‘apprenticeship of observation’ (Lortie, 1975).

These understandings could conceivably serve the purpose of concretizing their already held

beliefs about teaching and learning rather than developing professional, “warranted

assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p. 15) about teaching and learning. This is not a negative

condition per se, in fact, it is precisely the prejudices pre-service teachers have about teaching

and learning that are necessary for them to enter into a conversation (Gadamer, 1976) with their

field experience. Indeed,

Only the support of familiar and common understanding makes possible the venture into

the alien, the lifting up of something out of the alien, and thus the broadening and enrichment of

our own experience of the world (Gadamer, 1976, p. 15).

But relying on familiar understanding alone will not create new insights. Rodgers (2002)

points to reflection as a means of not only uncovering these preconceptions, but also analyzing

and reducing them to workable localized theories of teaching. In this way, reflection is

communal (Dewey, 1933) and takes collision with another person’s horizon (Gadamer, 1976) to

bring into existence imaginative ‘warranted assertabilities’ about teaching and learning.

Therefore, I believe the pre-service teacher needs the guidance of a knowledgeable other

(Vygotsky, 1978) to assist her/him in the conversation they have with their field experiences. In

addition to attending to the “local-level” influences that affect a pre-service teachers’ reflections

(Hallman, 2011), the knowledgeable other can assist by placing emphasis on pertinent aspects of

the experience on which to reflect, if she/he is present during the reflection process. For example,

in my work with Jenny, a preservice teacher, we had a conversation about a literate discussion

she facilitated with kindergarteners. She placed emphasis on the part of the experience in which

the children were calling out and being so excited as to pop out of their seated position on the

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floor. She did not place emphasis on what the children were actually saying which presented

strong evidence of kindergarteners thinking deeply about a text (which was something she was

quite skeptical of before she engaged in facilitating this lesson). If Jenny were reflecting in

isolation and writing about this experience, she could have come to the conclusion that

kindergarteners are not capable of having a literate conversation because of their behavior. This

conclusion would not be a warranted assertablility given the ample evidence from the experience

that demonstrates otherwise. Similar to Jenny, I wonder what misunderstandings the pre-service

teachers in the aforementioned studies could have had without the guidance of a knowledgeable

other throughout the process of reflection.

Not only does it appear that judgment was not attended to in study designs where

researchers defined reflection as writing in isolation about a field experience from memory or

video, but it is also unclear as to the role dissonance played in the process of reflection in these

studies. For example, when the design of the study requires pre-service teachers to submit

weekly reflective journal entries, I believe an authentic experience of dissonance is questionable

at best for reasons associated with judgment. Remember, the conditions for a person to

experience dissonance include a high- choice situation in which adverse consequences occur

(Zanna & Copper, 1974) and a person’s sense of responsibility for those consequences (Cooper,

2007). It is unclear as to the amount of choice the pre-service teachers had in their field

experience on which they were writing (Did they create the lesson they were teaching?, Were

they using a pre-packaged curriculum?, Did the collaborating teacher tell them what to teach,

etc.?) and whether or not they assumed responsibility for the outcomes of their actions. Without

an authentic experience of dissonance, would the process of reflection even begin? Without an

authentic experience of reflection is the pre-service teacher merely left to describe her or his

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experience, i.e. think about it. This lack of authentic experience could account for the findings of

what is considered low-levels of reflection (descriptive) present in the writing of preservice

teachers. Perhaps, reflection, in the Deweyian sense did not even occur.

And what about dialectic tension? If, the pre-service teachers did indeed have the

judgment to discern a pertinent aspect of their field experience and they did experience

dissonance, how was that dissonance engaged with in a way that results in fruitful

understandings about teaching and learning? How, by writing in isolation, can pre-service

teachers ‘stay with’ the dissonance and not resort to merely justifying their actions in order to

alleviate the discomfort associated with dissonance (Elliot & Devine, 1994). How do pre-service

teachers ‘stay with’ an experience in which they feel responsible for an adverse outcome? Does

the process of writing help to create the dialectic tension necessary to move thinking and create

new understandings?

The previous question makes me think about writing as a medium to aid reflection.

Writing is a complex process in itself and includes purpose, motivation, idea generation,

awareness of audience, knowledge of genre, text structures, and working and long term memory

(Torrance & Galbraith, 2006). All of these are in play when pre-service teachers are required or

asked to write about a memory of a field experience. How do pre-service teachers view the

purpose of writing about their field experiences? Is it to earn a good grade, to please the

instructor, to ‘look good’ as a teacher, to transform their thinking, etc.? Does the awareness of

the audience (the instructor) impact, in positive or negative ways, the topic and word choice of

their writing? Do the cognitive loads of working memory (phonological, visual/spatial ,

semantic) and long-term memory (task schemata, topic knowledge, audience knowledge,

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linguistic knowledge, genre knowledge) interfere with knowledge construction. What writing

strategies do pre-service teachers engage in when writing about their field experiences?

There is evidence which suggests writing strategies can consist of both knowledge telling

and/or knowledge transformation. McCutchen, Teske and Bankson (2008) discuss Bereiter and

Scadamalia’s use of these terms and describe knowledge telling as a strategy that involves young

writers probing their memory “with a cue derived from the writing assignment’s topic or genre

and retrieving relevant knowledge for the text” (p.452). Knowledge transformation is a strategy

which “initiates interactions between content and rhetorical knowledge, with the potential for

transforming both” (p.452).

Can pre-service teachers use the strategy of knowledge transformation in their writing? It

is not lost on me that I am using the strategy of knowledge transformation right now as I am

staying with dissonance and creating dialectic tension in an effort to see anew. However, I differ

from a pre-service teacher writing about their field experiences in that I am not a novice with

either the content (reflection) or this genre of writing. And I am in conversational relation with

knowledgeable others as I engage with the theoretical writings about reflection and have

conversations with my colleagues. The question arises, can a pre-service teacher reflect (engage

in knowledge transformation, create “warranted assertabilities”) in the medium of writing if they

have novice understandings of content knowledge (teaching and learning) and limited fluency

with the genre of journals, critical incident papers, reflective papers, etc.? If indeed pre-service

teachers have limited content knowledge of teaching and learning and limited fluency with the

genres in which they are required to write, then it is not so surprising that the resulting pieces of

writing rarely display evidence of knowledge transformation (Chamoso & Caceres 2008;

Liakopoulou, 2012), or I would argue evidence of reflection.

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When I step back and look at the whole strand of research in which reflection is

operationalized as a non-communal activity of writing in isolation about a memory or video of a

field experience, I get the sense of researchers attempting to look in the direction of reflection

but not quite seeing it. Given theoretical considerations such as dissonance, judgment, and

dialectic tension, I wonder if these studies were designed in a way to not see reflection at all.

Perhaps the studies measured pre-service teachers’ ability to write in a particular genre. Maybe

the nature of the writing prompt and writing in isolation encouraged description of an experience

because they lacked the concepts and language necessary to create any more meaning than that

on their own. Maybe we do not know much about reflection from these studies but rather levels

of thinking present in pre-service teachers’ writing.

Reflection as Communal Activity

The second main thread I created in the literature is when pre-service teachers were asked

or required to reflect with others. Researchers require pre-service teachers to reflect in dialogic

relation with peers (Rhine & Bryant, 2007) and/or with university supervisors (Orland-Barak &

Rachamim, 2009) in both asynchronous and synchronous environments.

In asynchronous dialogic interaction with peers. Some researchers conceptualize

reflection as writing in an on-line asynchronous, dialogic environment with peers about

memories of field experiences. For example, Shoffner (2009) asked pre-service teachers to

voluntarily maintain a weblog for the course of the eight month study. Findings from this study

indicate that the pre-service teachers liked the communal aspect of maintaining a reflective blog

and appreciated the feedback they received by their peers. One participant noted “anyone who

has an internet connection can just come on in and agree with you or disagree, give you advice”

(p.156). However, she found pre-service teachers drastically decreasing the number of their posts

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over time and she did not make reference to the reflective quality of the posts. This study points

to a significant problem that arises when thinking is confused with reflection. It is concerning to

me that a participant viewed what was called reflection as enjoyable because ‘anyone with an

internet connection can agree of disagree and give advice.’ I believe these are the experiences

that can be miseducative (Dewey, 1933). For meaningful, “warranted assertabilities” to be

created about teaching and learning, understandings that will positively impact the learning of

young children, intelligent action and the rigorous process of reflection with a knowledgeable

other is needed, not casual dialogue with ‘anyone with an internet connection.’

Harland and Wondra (2011) did measure the quality of reflection present in both paper

and blog entries. They compared the depth of reflection achieved by pre-service teachers who

maintained free-topic blogs and those who wrote reflective papers scaffolded by guiding

questions. They report that 16.7% of the papers were non-reflective while only 7% of the blog

entries were non-reflective. Seventy-five percent of the papers reached a level of understanding

while 62.8% of the blog entries reached understanding. Only 8.3% of the papers written

demonstrated evidence of reflective thinking while 30.2% of the blog entries did. No samples

provided evidence of critical reflection, which leads me to believe that reflection probably did

not occur at all. Bean and Stevens (2002) required pre-service teachers to engage in weekly

reflections on an Internet bulletin board. Each week a prompt was given to the pre-service

teachers as a way to scaffold their thinking. The instructor provided examples of appropriate

responses to entries and drew attention to those posts that were particularly reflective. Findings

show students predominantly making reference to their personal beliefs and course texts.

Students often used their posts to agree with the positions of their peers. Additionally, the pre-

service teachers did not appear to challenge large societal Discourses about adolescents.

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Although these researchers provided support in the form of positive examples and guiding

questions, it appears as though the roles of judgment, and dialectic tension were not attended to

in the design of this study. Therefore, it is not surprising that pre-service teachers relied on their

personal beliefs and course texts. They can only rely on what they have. This is why it is

important that the process of reflection is experienced with a knowledgeable other. Bean and

Stevens note that the scaffolding provided by the prompts helped to focus the posts but did not

result in pre-service teachers reflecting at the deepest levels. Again, a focus on a topic does not

equate with reflection and the creation of “warranted assertabilities.” In line with Harland and

Wondra (2011) and Bean and Stevens (2002), Ng and Tan (2009) document pre-service teachers

having difficulty articulating problems of practice and engaging in insufficient reflection to solve

ill-structured problems. Whipp (2003), using a design experiment, documents the depth of

reflection evidenced in pre-service teachers’ email conversations with one another over the

course of two semesters. She reports pre-service teachers primarily relying on their personal

experience and perviously held beliefs. During the first semester of the study, 44% of the pre-

service teachers’ email conversations were non-reflective, 43% were descriptive, 11% were

dialogic and a mere 1% were critical. After adding guided questions as a scaffold to promote

deeper levels of reflection, 15% of the conversations were non-reflective, 46% were descriptive,

28% were dialogic, and 11% were critical. However, considering Dewey’s (1933) distinction

between thinking and reflection, descriptive and dialogic levels would not qualify as reflection.

In asynchronous dialogic interaction with peers and instructors. Rocco (2010)

examined the required posts pre-service teachers made to an on-line discussion board. The

researcher required that the posts take the form of a letter to a critical friend and the researcher,

as instructor for the course, often responded to the letters. Like Shoffner’s (2001) findings,

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participants expressed enjoyment from the communal aspect of the on-line space and the ability

to hear from multiple perspectives. However, reference to the quality of the letters submitted to

the discussion board is absent from this study. The above studies provide evidence of how

reflection, as a ubiquitous term in teacher education, is often misappropriated. Singer and Zeni

(2004) coded five semesters of voluntary email conversations which occurred between pre-

service teachers and faculty. Findings show pre-service teachers retelling frustrations from their

field experiences and offering support to one another by giving advice. The email discussions

were dominated by pre-service teacher to pre-service teacher interaction as only 22% of all posts

included faculty members. The authors do not report on the quality of the conversations. This

study seems to have incorporated opportunities for the pre-service teachers to have an experience

of authentic dissonance as entries were voluntary and the entries did include expressed

frustrations. However, it is unclear the extent to which dialectic tension was created with

knowledgeable others in ways that did or did not result in “warranted assertabilities.”

Anderson and Matkins (2011) did level the reflective blogs of the pre-service teachers

with whom they worked. The pre-service teachers in this study were required to write weekly

reflective posts and respond to one of their peers’ blog posting for the week. The instructors

maintained their own blogs and responded to the pre-service teachers’ posts with guiding

questions intended to promote critical thinking. Their findings indicate 39% of the posts

provided evidence of non-reflective/understanding thought. Just over 57% of the posts exhibited

reflective thought while only 3.7% of the posts showed evidence of critical reflection. A

secondary finding showed that higher levels of reflection occurred when the preservice teacher

wrote about her/his own teaching versus writing about observations of the collaborating teachers

they observed. Khourey-Bowers (2005) reported that individual postings demonstrated

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satisfactory levels of reflection while threaded discussions with peers and instructors provided

evidence of effective or distinguished levels of reflection suggesting that interaction with peers

and instructors has a positive impact on the levels of reflection. It seems as though the

researchers in this study attended to the role of judgment in reflection as they, as knowledgeable

others, attempted to create dialectic tension through the questions they asked. I wonder though

what is meant by reflective thought in the leveling scheme they employed.

A look across these studies provides an evidentiary base which suggests dialogic,

asynchronous, on-line environments are experienced as enjoyable (Shoffner, 2001) by pre-

service teachers, encourage higher-levels of reflection than mediums in which pre-service

teachers are required or asked to reflect in isolation (Harland & Wondra, 2011) but still do not

provide evidence of pre-service teachers’ reflective entries reaching the highest level (Bean &

Stevens, 2002) which are associated with increased quality of teaching (Cohen-Sayag & Fischl,

2012). However, did the authors of these studies define reflection in such a way as to confuse it

with thinking?

It appears as though asynchronous on-line environments provide affordances to the

writing process that pre-service teachers find enjoyable. Asynchronous environments allow users

to engage in peer interaction (engage directly with their audience), read and respond at their own

pace, write for a wider audience (blogs) and allow for extended time for interaction and learning

(Meyer, 2003). Perhaps asynchronous environments create a sense of community which pre-

service teachers find pleasant. But is a community of pre-service teachers who are novices in

teaching and learning able to move beyond the writing strategy of knowledge telling to

knowledge transformation (the result of reflective thinking)? Evidence provided from this set of

empirical literature suggests no. Even when an instructor is present in the asynchronous space,

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there is limited evidence (Khourey-Bowers, 2005) that suggests the writing demonstrated high

levels of reflection. Additionally, writing as the medium of reflection in asynchronous

environments still presents problems I discussed earlier, namely, can a pre-service teacher reflect

(engage in knowledge transformation) in the medium of writing if they have novice

understandings of content knowledge (teaching and learning) and limited fluency with the genre

of blogs, emails, discussion boards?

Although it would appear an asynchronous environment could establish a space for the

development of critical friends (Bambino, 2002), it is clear from these studies that the space

tends to be dominated by dialogue consisting of support, personal beliefs, and description. A

focus on ‘feel good’ or neutral interactions could be explained by Wachob’s (2011) findings that

peers can feel fear and/or rejection when giving and receiving critical feedback. Additionally, a

focus on support, personal beliefs, and description falls short of what Bambino (2002) describes

as a community of critical friends (in-service teachers) in which a knowledgeable other (a critical

friends coach) facilitates the process of reflecting on one’s teaching and its impact on student

learning. Therefore, I believe the presence of a knowledgeable other is necessary. But it is more

complicated than that. It is not just the presence of a knowledgeable other but whether the

knowledgeable other has pedagogical knowledge of reflection and is able to create the dialectic

tension required for reflection to occur.

Undergirding these studies is the assumption that the pre-service teachers involved had

the judgment necessary to place emphasis on the pertinent aspects of their experience. In each of

these designs the pre-service teachers self-selected pieces of their experience for a free topic blog

entry or a given prompt. This can be problematic. For example, a preservice teacher I worked

with in the past was concerned that one of the students she was working with was off-task and

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refused to participate by reading aloud a passage from an article. She attributed this behavior to

the student’s ‘laziness.’ She failed to place emphasis on the fact that the text she required the

student to read was at his frustration level and so his behavior was that of avoidance so as to not

be embarrassed in front of his peers. Are pre-service teachers missing opportunities to reflect and

develop understandings about the relationship between teaching and student learning when they

are self-selecting aspects of their experience to examine with each other and/or university

supervisors?

In synchronous dialogic relation with peers and collaborating teachers. Some

researchers have studied the reflective practices of pre-service teachers as they reflect on their

memories of field experiences in synchronous conversations with peers, collaborating teachers

and university supervisors.

Genor (2005) examined the conversations that took place within a pre-service teacher

study group that met bi-monthly and talked about their field experiences. Genor proposes a

framework of reflection that includes un-problematized reflection, problematized reflection, and

critically problematized reflection. Within the study group, the pre-service teachers most often

talked about their teaching in descriptive, general ways and did not “demonstrate any critique of

their teaching” (p.54). Very few examples were found in which the pre-service teachers

problematized their teaching. No examples were found in which the pre-service teachers

critically problematized their teaching. Genor concluded that she found “no examples of

dramatic shifts in any of the pre-service teachers’ thinking” (p.58). But how would these shifts in

thinking have occurred? The design of the study did not attend to the roles of judgment,

knowledgable others or dialectic tension. Asking pre-service teachers to talk about their field

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experiences is not the same as engaging in the careful and attentive process of reflection as

described by Dewey (1933).

Ottesen (2007) analyzed the conversation that took place between pre-service teachers

and their collaborating teachers as they discussed shared memories of the pre-service teachers’

field experiences. Ottesen reports three types of reflection occurring in the analyzed

conversations: reflection as induction (56.8%), reflection as concept development (32%) and

reflection as imagined practice (11.2%). Ottensen reports that although reflection was evident in

nearly every session, “it is commonly neither systematic nor extended in time” (p.36). Although

the researcher reports that reflection was evident, I question if reflection occurred. It appears as

though the researcher defined the quality of perceived reflation based on the topics of the

conversation. And as noted earlier, the topic does not determine whether or not reflection

transpired. Similarly, Stegman (2007) found the conversations which took place between pre-

service teachers and their collaborating teachers to most frequently be centered on technical,

clinical and personal issues while critical topics were less discussed.

Sharma, Phillion & Malewski (2011) documented the process pre-service teachers go

through as they reflect on their experiences in a study abroad program. As part of the program,

the researchers, who were also the participants instructors, used Dewey’s (1933) steps in the

reflective process to provide various kinds of support throughout the reflective cycle. To make

clear the participants current frame of reference and beliefs, the instructors engaged in individual

conferences. The pre-service teachers engaged in synchronous conversation as they were

experiencing dissonance, it was through conversation with peers that they also interpreted and

worked through the expressed dissonance, and then in journal writing, the participants worked

through the ideas created through discussion and began to transform their prior beliefs. And

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finally, a last conversation with their instructors revealed their understanding that beliefs must

constantly undergo revision. The researchers report the success of these supports in fostering

critical reflection.

The same problems which were present in dialogic, asynchronous environments seem to

apply to synchronous environments. Low levels of reflection were reported when the

conversation took place between peers or between pre-service teachers and their collaborating

teachers. These findings could be attributed to issues of judgment, lack of dialectic tension,

content knowledge and abilities of knowledgeable others, and possible absence of authentic

dissonance. There is an interesting exception in this group of studies. Sharma et al. did attend to

the process of reflection and put into place different kinds of support structures for each phase of

reflection. Conversation with peers during the dissonance and interpretation phases, writing

during the explication of ideas phase, and conversation with instructors during the transformation

of previously held beliefs phase. Although the researchers report these supports fostered critical

reflection, I have more questions. Is an authentic experience of dissonance more likely to occur

in settings which are foreign to the participants, what role did judgement play in their experience

of dissonance, did they experience dissonance around issues of teaching and learning or about

cultural differences and expectations, in what ways did the conversation with peers provide

enough ideas to engage in knowledge transformation writing rather than knowledge telling

writing? This study design represents possibilities for future research.

In dialogic relation using the mediums of video and conversation. Rhine & Bryant

(2007) operationalized reflection as viewing video of oneself and one’s peers teaching and then

being in dialogic relation with each other in the asynchronous space of a discussion board.

Participants in this study were required to select a two to four minute clip of a lesson and post it

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to Blackboard. Peers were then required to comment on the video. They report pre-service

teachers providing support and positive feedback to one another and focused on instructional and

classroom management.

Another study added the additional support of the university supervisor to the dialogue

about videoed instruction. In a study designed by Harford and MacRuairc (2008), pre-service

teachers were required to video their teaching. In a tutorial session, each pre-service teacher was

required to show their video to the group after providing the rationale for the lesson and relevant

contextual information. The university supervisor was present to facilitate the conversation to “

encourage debate and foster reflection” (p.1886) by posing questions. Findings from this study

document the students becoming more reflective as the year progressed.

Other studies use video as a tool to aid in the reflection process. Husu, Toom and

Patrikainen (2008) analyzed the conversation between pre-service teachers and their university

supervisors using a video stimulated recall method. They coded for levels of reflection present in

the conversations and found nearly one third of the talk to be focused on habitual reflection

(description) and 33% of the talk to occur at the introspective level (how a teacher feels about the

experience and how it affects them). Little evidence was provided that pre-service teachers in

conversation with their university supervisors reflected at moderate to high levels. And as Dewey

(1933) would note, description and feelings are not reflection. Sewall (2009) also examined the

effect video-elicited dialogue between pre-service teachers and their university supervisor has on

levels of reflection. In this comparison study, the participants were required to reflect in

conversation with a supervisor after they had taught a lesson in which the supervisor observed.

The same pre-service teachers were then required to select a 15 minute portion of video of their

teaching (a different lesson). Both the supervisor and the pre-service teacher viewed the video

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and made notes. The conversation they had with each other about the videoed lesson was

recorded and transcribed. Findings show the supervisor making the majority of reflective

comments in the observation model while the pre-service teachers made more reflective

comments in the video elicited conversations.

In a second-order action research mentoring model, Orland-Barak and Rachamim (2009),

examined the reflective practices of university supervisors as they have conversations with pre-

service teachers. Pre-service teachers taught a lesson while the university supervisor videoed the

lesson. They engaged in a brief conversation (which was also videoed) after the observation. The

pre-service teachers then viewed the video of their teaching and the university supervisor viewed

the video of the conversation that took place after the lesson. They met again to have a

conversation around the initial videoed lesson. Findings demonstrate the university supervisor

improving in striking a balance between guidance and control in conversations with pre-service

teachers. I believe this study attempts to provide insight into how a knowledgeable other can

improve her/his ability to create dialectic tension throughout the reflection process.

The above collection of studies indicate that using video of one’s own teaching to

stimulate reflection produces positive effects. Although few of the researchers documented the

specific levels of reflection demonstrated by writing about the video or having a conversation

about the video, they make claims that the reflection is of higher quality when video is present

than when the pre-service teachers are required to reflect upon their memory of a field

experience. I think this intuitively makes sense; the presence of a video ameliorates some of the

negative aspects of relying on memory. However, I do not believe the presence of video alone

ameliorates the roles judgment, dissonance and dialectic tension play in the reflective process. In

addition, the use of video creates the role of audience and spectator, critic and judge.

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When video of themselves teaching becomes the text upon which pre-service teachers are

required or asked to think about it becomes important to ask what does it mean to read such a

text. Reading a text can be considered a dialectic act. Reading is conversing with the text,

working through the text, and emerging transformed. Readers do this by making connections,

questioning the text and author, making inferences, determining importance, and synthesizing

(Duke & Pearson, 2002). The dialectic tension between the reader’s thinking and the author’s

text (in this the video of oneself teaching) creates a change in the reader. In this way, reading a

text can be viewed as a transactional and transformational process (Rosenblatt, 1978).

But are the strategies that readers use to interact with a text similar to those of writing--

namely knowledge telling and knowledge transformation? Would a pre-service teacher need to

possess enough content knowledge to “initiate[s] interactions between content and rhetorical

knowledge, with the potential for transforming both” (McCutchen et al., 2006, p.452). Or is a

knowledgeable other needed to provide the judgment necessary to create and ‘stay with’ the

dissonance possible by reading a video of one’s own teaching?

Additionally, the literature on using video to elicit reflection seems to make

unproblematic the notion of reading an experience of which a person is part author. What makes

reflection on field experiences particularly challenging/awkward is that the reader is also part

author of the text (video of teaching) she/he is reading. For example, the pre-service teacher is

reading a text (video of her/himself teaching). The text was created in part by her/him and is

now being brought into dialogue with the present version of her/himself. The pre-service teacher

needs to read (enter into dialectic relation with) this text by making connections, questioning the

text and the author, making inferences, determining importance, and synthesizing, in order to be

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transformed. What psychological factors come into play when pre-service teachers need to

question themselves and a text they created?

The above description of reading a text of which a person is part author and using

dialectic strategies to question and make changes (transform) ones ideas calls to mind a revision

process. In other words, through reflection, pre-service teachers are being asked to question

themselves and their actions and the outcomes of their actions in an effort to revise their thinking

and/or beliefs about teaching and learning. The literature on revision, in writing anyway,

suggests that the revision process occurs in dialogue with a knowledgable other, most often in

the form of writing conferences (Beach & Friedrich, 2006). Thinking of reflection as a revision

(transformation) of one’s thinking which occurs when one’s horizon (Gadamer, 1976) collides

with another’s (in this case a knowledgeable other) opens up possibilities for future study. How

do the pre-service teacher and the knowledgeable other read the text (the video of the pre-service

teacher teaching) and create a space in which a ‘fusion of horizons’ (Gadamer, 1976) can occur?

Implications for Future Study

As stated at the beginning of this paper, there has been a recent call for increased quantity

and quality of field experiences in order to prepare pre-service teachers to meet the demands of

increasingly complex teaching placements (NCATE, 2010). Recognizing that more time in field

placements does not necessarily equate to increased quality of those experiences (Allsopp,

DeMarie, Alvarez-McHatton, & Doone, 2006; Ronfelt & Reininger, 2012), it is imperative that

teacher educators seek new understandings about how pre-service teachers create “warranted

assertabilities” from their field experiences, namely, how they reflect on those experiences.

In a prior review of empirical literature on reflection and pre-service teacher education,

Roskos et al. (2001) point to a lack of an evidentiary base within the literature due to the varying

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ways researchers define reflection. In this review, I found that not only are researchers defining

reflection in multiple ways, it appears as though the designs of their studies do not attend to

critical aspects of reflection (dissonance, judgment, knowledgeable others, dialectic tension).

Although the stated phenomenon under consideration is reflection, I wonder if the majority of

these studies examined thinking rather than reflection. Researchers seem compelled to level the

artifacts of what they define as reflection. I wonder if the pre-occupation with leveling the

artifacts of what is perceived to be reflection has created an illusion of examining reflection and

has impeded researchers’ efforts to design creative, complex studies.

When reflection is defined as the

Active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or

supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that

support it and the further conclusions to which it tends (Dewey,

1933, p.9)

is it possible or even necessary to level? If a “warranted assertability” is created as a result of

reflection then what is there to level?

What would a study design look like that attends to the process of reflection? In

whichever paradigm (quantitative, qualitative) and using whichever methodology (case study,

phenomenology, critical theory, etc.) the researcher would need to attend to the aforementioned

aspects of reflection. For example, it seems as though dissonance, being the impetus for

reflection is a part of the process about which little is understood. And if, as Cognitive

Dissonance Theory (Cooper, 2007) suggests, dissonance occurs in high-choice situations, is

experienced only if adverse consequences occur (Linder, Copper & Jones, 1967), when a person

believes they are responsible for the adverse consequences (Cooper, 2007), then it would seem

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important to include these elements in the research design. To study dissonance, the pre-service

teacher would be in a high-choice situation, experience an adverse consequence and feel

responsible for that consequence. If those conditions were present then an analysis of the pre-

service teachers’ writing or conversation would be pertinent to understanding dissonance and it’s

role in reflection.

But what of judgment? Perhaps pre-service teachers do not experience dissonance around

teaching and learning because of the limited content knowledge they posses about teaching and

learning. Then maybe a video of the pre-service teacher engaged in teaching in which they had a

high-level of choice in their teaching actions is discussed by both the knowledgeable other and

the pre-service teacher. A study could examine how and if the knowledgeable other is able to use

her/his judgment to read the text of the pre-service teacher teaching and, through questioning,

point to aspects of the experience that are pertinent for analysis/synthesis -aspects of the

experience that provide evidence which could be used to make ‘warranted assertabilities’ about

teaching and its relation to learning.

And what of a knowledgeable other and their ability to create dialectic tension? What is it

like to ‘stay with’ dissonance in relation with a pre-service teacher? How does one create

dialectic tension rather than dialogic interaction?

You can see the complexity here but I believe, collectively, as researchers dedicated to

understanding how pre-service teachers reflect and create “warranted assertabilities” from their

field experiences we can create imaginative and complex research designs which operationalize

reflection as a process including judgment, dissonance, dialectic tension, and interaction with

knowledgeable others’ to begin to gain fresh insights into the process of reflection.

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The work that has been forged thus far is important work. Hermeneutic engagement with

this literature base has helped to create new understandings about the complexities of studying

reflection for me and possibly for the readers of this paper as they use their prejudices (Gadamer,

1976) about reflection to create new insights into possibilities for studying reflection.

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Chapter Three

Methodology/Methods

Introduction

In the prior review, I used Dewey’s (1933) concepts of dissonance, judgment,

knowledgeable others, and dialectic tension to explore parameters of reflection as a communal

process of creating “warranted assertabilities” (p. Dewey, 1938, p.15) from experience. Using

Roskos, Vukelich, and Risko’s (2001) notion of historical continuity, I interpreted patterns in the

literature on pre-service teacher reflection. Notably, I found that researchers primarily define

reflection as thinking about a past experience rather than a specific mode of thought, prompted

by dissonance in experience, which creates “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15)

about teaching and learning. I presented that perhaps much of the empirical literature researchers

have created so far in the name of reflection has pointed toward reflection but seems to not have

worked with the complexities of reflection as a communal process (Branscombe & Schneider,

2013) which involves judgment, dissonance, and dialectic tension (Dewey, 1933). In other

words, researchers have leveled the products (written documents, conversations) that result when

pre-service teachers are required or asked to reflect but the actual process of reflection with pre-

service teachers seems to remain hidden.

Given that little is known of the actual process of reflection as experienced by pre-service

teachers; some exploratory work is in order. However, because reflection is ubiquitous in teacher

education and is defined and operationalized in a myriad of ways (Collin, Karsenti, & Komis,

2012) by practitioners and researchers alike (see Appendix A), it is important to explore

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reflection within a methodology that is sensitive enough to create data of a person’s experience

and rigorous enough to create the dialectic tension needed to produce ‘fresh’ understandings

about a construct as rife (common and unchecked) as reflection is in teacher education. To me,

that methodology is hermeneutic phenomenology (Gadamer, 1976; Van Manen,1990).

For this study, I engaged in an hermeneutic phenomenology as I inquired into the

experience of reflection as lived by Dana, a pre-service teacher with whom I worked. This study

was guided by the primary question: What is Dana’s experience of dialectic reflection with a

knowledgeable other? What new insights about reflection can be created by juxtaposing her

described experience of reflection with multi-disciplinary theoretical writings?

Context

In Chapter Two, I made the case that in order to study reflection, it would seem that one

would need to examine the entire process of reflection rather than only the artifacts created when

a pre-service teacher is required or asked to reflect. I believe the researcher would also have to

attend to the other aspects of reflection namely, dispositions, dissonance, judgment, dialectic

tension, and interaction with knowledgeable others. In this section, I detail the contextual factors

that are salient to this study. I describe the participants (Dana and myself), our interaction, and

the conditions that were in place for reflection to occur.

Dana

Dana is 22 year old, Caucasian woman. She was born and raised in Massachusetts and

shares fond memories of her childhood and a desire to return home after graduation. I have

noticed that people either really like her or don’t. She had a handful of close friends who were

also enrolled in our program who she worked with and regularly spent time with outside of class.

Conversely, some of her peers found her difficult to work with as she thought outside of the box

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and frequently asked questions that disrupted the “let’s just get it done” attitudes that some of her

peers displayed when working on projects. I have also witnessed some of her collaborating

teachers finding her pleasant to work with while others have had significant difficulty when she

questioned some of the teaching practices she observed in her field experiences that did not align

with her beliefs and/or ideas from coursework. Additionally, some of her instructors found her to

be friendly and likable but challenging in that she thinks deeply about issues and pedagogy, but

also creates problems stemming from her personal work habits that cause disruption and delay

for others. She asks deep questions but does not work in a timely manner.

She is enthusiastic about teaching and speaks firmly about her opinions about the

purposes of education and issues of equity for students. She is complicated. Although she

displays this enthusiasm regularly by engaging in conversations and debates with her peers and

instructors (myself included), she has another side to her personality that many would

characterize as heedless. There were times in class when I wondered if she was attending to what

we were doing. She has little respect for deadlines and assignments that she perceives as

inauthentic. At times she has nodded off during class. Given her limited apprenticeship in

teaching and her developing understandings about teaching and learning, some instructors found

her actions inconsiderate. I have worked with Dana for four semesters. Over the two years I have

laughed with her, cried with her, gotten frustrated with her, and celebrated with her.

I find Dana to be a highly reflective person. In my conversations with her, she seemed to

think about her experiences in such a way as to create understandings about teaching and

learning which informed her future action. At different times, and in various ways, Dana

eventually displayed all of the dispositions about which Dewey writes! Many times she engaged

wholeheartedly in the process of learning about teaching and learning by engaging in many

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voluntary conversations with her peers and me about the purposes of education, her development

of teaching practices, problems she saw in her practice. etc. In other words she engaged her

whole self as she worked to learn about teaching and learning. She displayed a sense of

directness, in the Deweyian sense, in that she trusted her experiences as being valid content for

learning about teaching and learning. As such, she approached her field experiences with the

belief that she could learn from her own practice with children rather than relying on copying the

behaviors of her collaborating teachers. She did not worry about the judgment of others,

including her peers, collaborating teachers, and instructors as she would often share her differing

views with them in an attempt to debate and think through an issue. In the countless

conversations I have had with her, she remained open to entertain other perspectives and

question even her own deeply held beliefs. And lastly, she recognized the real-life applications of

her reflection and so exhibited what Dewey calls responsibility. All of these dispositions,

including her flaws,amalgamated into a stance of readiness to engage in reflective thought about

her field experiences.

It is for these reasons that I asked Dana if she would engage in conversations with me

about how she experiences reflection. And, as Dana would, she put her hand to her chest, opened

her eyes wide and said “Me?...Ab...so...lute...ly.” And that is how our conversations began.

My Role as Knowledgable Other

Because of the intimate and intricate connections among the researcher, the lived

experience and the researcher with the participant, it is important to orient oneself to the

phenomenon in question. To orient oneself in phenomenological study means to express one’s

“station or vantage point in life” (Van Manen, 1990, p.40).

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I am a member of the community of practice (Wegner, 1998) of teaching. I orient myself

as a former elementary school teacher, current teacher educator, and a person who engages in

reflective thought. As a former elementary school teacher, I engaged in teaching much like the

description of Ms. Smith’s room in scene one of my introduction. Facilitating learning as

described in that scene takes much content and pedagogical knowledge. Throughout the years,

my work has been informed by many researchers and practitioners such as Cunningham and

Allington (2011), Fountas and Pinnell (1996), Harvey and Goudvis (2000), Johnson (2004),

Keene (2008), Miller (2008), Routman (1991), Keene and Zimmerman (1997), to name a few.

My hermeneutic engagement with their work and the resulting ‘fusion of horizons’ (Gadamer,

1976) has led and continues to lead me to ever new understandings about literacy and teaching

and learning. These understandings have colored my work with young children over the years

and continues to color the ways in which I interact with students (elementary students and

university students alike). The praxis I have developed in facilitating the learning of elementary

students is part of my role as knowledgeable other. Because I have both content and pedagogical

knowledge that has been tested and refined through practice and reflective thinking, I have at

hand a wealth of ideas and anecdotes about teaching and learning.

However, ideas and anecdotes alone do not solely constitute the role of knowledgeable

other. It is how I used those ideas and stories to create dialectic tension with Dana as we

reflected together about her teaching that also factored into my role of knowledgeable other. I

distinguish dialectic tension from dialogic interaction. I draw from the rich philosophical history

of dialectics as a means by which exploring opposing concepts help to inquire into contradictions

and solutions. I argue that it is the tension brought about through dialectic engagement with

experience and an other that plays a central role in the process of reflection. Merely taking turns

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talking about an experience with a knowledgeable other (dialogic interaction), will most likely

not create new understandings.

As such, I approached my role as knowledgeable other as different than a sounding board

for Dana to share how she thought her lesson went and what would she change if she had the

opportunity to do it again. By using my content and pedagogical knowledge to ask questions that

were intended to create dialectic tension, Dana and I worked to ‘stay with’ the tension long

enough and skillfully enough to fuse our horizons.

This is not neat and clean work. In fact, I found it to be extraordinarily difficult as

evidenced by my numerous journal entries that expressed my own dissonance with this process.

That dissonance was an impetus to reflect and more closely examine my pedagogies through a

design experiment (Gelfuso & Dennis, 2013, in review). In the design experiment, I initially

found myself to engage in far too much story telling and telling of pedagogical ideas in an effort

to create dialectic tension. Thus, I changed my practice to include a balance of questions

intended to create dissonance and anecdotal examples from my own practice. In this way, I

continued and continue to refine my role as knowledgeable other.

Another aspect of my role as knowledgeable other was to be seen by Dana as a competent

teacher of elementary students. How else would she entertain any ideas and anecdotes I had

about teaching and learning? How else would she feel compelled to endure the difficulty of

‘staying with‘ the tension we created in an effort to create “warranted assertabilities” about

teaching and learning? Therefore, I occasionally modeled a particular pedagogy (Guided

Reading for example) with the elementary students that Dana taught. I also shared video of

myself teaching in other elementary classrooms to illustrate the possibility of such pedagogies

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being successful in facilitating student learning, as well as to show Dana my competence with

teaching elementary students.

It is my understanding that I possess the qualities of a knowledgeable other in the

community of practice of teaching. I have deep and facile content and pedagogical knowledge. I

continually engaged in reflection about my own experiences with creating dialectic tension with

Dana and I provided opportunities for Dana to see me as a competent model of ‘teacher’. For

these reasons, I believe the condition of interaction with a knowledgeable other was met for this

study.

The Elementary Teacher Residency Program

Dana and I worked together within the larger setting of the Elementary Teacher

Residency Program (ETRP) at a large southeastern university. The ETRP was designed in

response to calls for increased quantity and quality of field experiences in teacher education

programs (NCATE, 2010). The ETRP was developed in partnership with three Professional

Development Schools (PDS). As described by Danielle Dennis, the associate professor who was

largely responsible for the development of the program (Gelfuso & Dennis, 2013, p. 8, in

review),

The focus of the program moved from understanding children’s diverse needs in semester

one, a literacy block focused on using data to make instructional decisions in semester two, arts

integration in semester three, and then a focus on STEM in the year-long residency internship

(semesters 4 and 5).

Being a member of the ETRP required Dana’s presence (either in coursework or

structured field experiences) Monday-Friday, 7:30am-3:30pm. Additionally, she was required to

engage in a year-long, full time residency experience in the final year of the program.

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At the time of this study, the ETRP was in its infancy as my colleagues and I were

working with the first group of thirteen students to complete the program. Dana was one of those

thirteen.

My role in the ETRP included facilitating our students’ learning in coursework

(Children’s Literature, Creative Experiences & Linking Literacy Assessments/Reading and

Learning to Read) as well as supervising the level two and final internships of our students.

Because I was responsible for both facilitating coursework and supervision, I included structured

field experiences as assignments that were required for the courses I taught. I also included

guided reflection conferences (which came to be known as Teaching Cycles) as a requirement

for these courses.

Teaching Cycles

Although the structure of the teaching cycles were modified and revised as the

result of the formative design experiment (Gelfuso & Dennis, in review), the following

description of a teaching cycle is accurate for the last two semesters in which Dana was a

member of the ETRP.

A teaching cycle was characterized by a series of events including:

• Dana forming an hypothesis she wished to test in experience. The hypothesis

was derived from course content, i.e. ‘If I have the children read a lot during

guided reading, then they will not comprehend the text.’

• Any lesson or series of lessons related to her hypothesis in which Dana

determined the needs of the students she was teaching

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• Dana planning (sometimes with my assistance, sometimes in collaboration with

her collaborating teacher or peers, sometimes alone) and facilitating those

lessons (all lessons were video-recorded)

• Dana determining whether the elementary students ‘learned’ what was ‘taught’

• Dana watching the video of herself teaching

• Dana coding the video using a support structure -marking times in the video

when she saw evidence of the eight pillars of effective literacy instruction (see

Appendix I) provided by Cunningham and Allington (2011). The eight pillars

are:

• Balanced, Comprehensive Instruction

•A Lot of Reading and Writing

•Science and Social Studies Integrated

•High-Level Thinking

•Skills Explicitly Taught and Coached

•Wide Variety of Materials

•Variety of Formats for Instruction

•Well Managed

• Dana coding for evidence that supported or refuted her hypothesis -marking

times in the video that she perceived to be indicative of support or refute,

providing a description of the moment, providing her rationale for choosing that

segment of the lesson as support/refute

• Dana making note of any additional parts of the video she found

salient/problematic

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• Myself coding Dana’s video- marking times when I saw evidence of the eight

pillars, marking moments where the eight pillars were missing but could have

been included, marking evidence of student motivation and student learning,

marking the questions Dana asked, etc.

• Myself reviewing my codes and determining (based on what I knew about

Dana’s development and what I perceived she was ready to explore) one to two

moments on which to create questions to ask Dana- for example ‘What did you

notice about how Samantha reacted when you asked her to read? Why do you

think she reacted that way? What do we know about her instructional reading

level?

• Dana and I meeting in person, each with our separate coding and the video

• Dana beginning the conversation by sharing her thinking about the eight pillars

of instruction and a conversation ensuing about those pillars

• Dana and I having a conversation (focused on her hypothesis) about her

teaching as evidenced in the video and its impact on student learning

• Dana confirming, modifying, changing her hypothesis (verbally and sometimes

in writing)

Conditions for Reflection

I believe the above description of a teaching cycle operationalizes reflection as a process

which involves judgment, dissonance, dialectic tension, and interaction with a knowledgeable

other. For example, the impetus for the teaching cycle is an hypothesis about teaching and

learning created by Dana with the support of ideas from our coursework. In other words to assist

Dana in exercising judgment as she selected an idea to test in experience, she was required to

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choose an idea from our course text and/or class discussions. The inclusion of an hypothesis to

be tested in her own experience also attends to Dewey’s description of both directness and

responsibility. I believe it helped foster a sense of directness because it made clear the idea that

her experience is valid and can be the place of learning. The fact that she tested her hypothesis

with the students with whom she worked, created a sense of responsibility (the idea that the

results of her reflection can be used in real-life).

The teaching cycles included the entire process (Gradual Release of Responsibility) of

teaching: determining students’ needs, planning, facilitating learning, determining the effects of

instruction, and creating meaning from the experience). This feature of the teaching cycles

attended to conditions for dissonance. For example, as a result of framing the teaching cycles

this way, Dana was in a high-choice situation (Zanna & Copper, 1974). She used what she

understood about diagnostic assessments to determine the needs of her students. She decided on

the lesson content and format based on those needs. She planned the lessons. She facilitated the

learning. She determined the impact her instruction had on student learning. Given that Dana was

a novice, it was probable that an ‘adverse‘ consequence would occur as the result of her practice

(Linder, Copper & Jones, 1967). Given her involvement in the entire teaching process, it was

possible that she would feel responsible for the ‘adverse’ consequences (Cooper, 2007).

Dana exercised her developing judgment, in the Deweyian sense, as she coded for

evidence that supported or refuted her hypothesis. When Dana was coding video of herself

teaching, I believe she was engaged in the first two phases of the process of reflection Dewey

describes,

(1) suggestions in which the mind leaps forward to a possible solution;


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(directly experienced) into a problem to be solved, a question for which the

answer must be sought...” (Dewey, 1933, p.107)

She was not left alone during these phases. She received support from knowledgeable

others in the form of lens’ through which to guide her coding. For example, she used

Cunningham & Allington’s (2011) eight pillars of effective literacy instruction to aid in her

judgment of the pertinent aspects of the experience to emphasize.

I also watched the video of Dana’s teaching, and coded it using my judgment. I made

notes of the salient aspects of the experience and wrote questions that I might ask in an effort to

create dialectic tension. For example, in one teaching cycle I made note of a child struggling with

decoding a particular text. In the margin, I wrote ‘What did you notice about Tammy’s reading?,

Why might she have been struggling?, etc. In this way I prepared to create dissonance for Dana

around pertinent aspects of teaching and learning that are present in her video. I also attended to

how ‘staying with‘ the dialectic tension I created with Dana could be skillfully facilitated so as to

result in a warranted assertability she could test in future experiences.

Lastly, engaging in a conversation with me, her knowledgeable other, provided support

as we engaged in the other phases of the process of reflection outlined by Dewey:



factual material;



the whole, of inference); and

(5) testing the hypothesis by overt or imaginative action. (p.107).

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During these conversations we consulted the video of her teaching as we each shared

what we judged to be of relevance. I guided the conversation as we mentally elaborated on ideas

that were pertinent to Dana’s teaching and its impact on student learning. We attended to the

idea that dissonance is experienced as discomfort (Elliot & Divine, 1994), by using humor at

times, as well as sharing our feeling of discomfort with each other.

I believe the context in which this study occurred satisfies the call I made in my literature

review for exploratory study of reflection as a process which involves judgment, dissonance,

dialectic tension, and interaction with knowledgeable others. Given the conditions of reflection

that were present, I believe Dana did experience reflection. The project of hermeneutic

phenomenology is to understand differently a particular phenomenon. Therefore, it was

important to have conversations with a person who, to the best of my understanding did

experience reflection. I believe much can be understood though hermeneutic engagement with

her described experience. Below I describe how I went about creating those understandings in

the tradition of hermeneutic phenomenology Gadamer, 1976; Van Manen, 1990).

Methods

“The real power of hermeneutical consciousness is our ability to see what is

questionable.”

Gadamer, 1976, p.13

Phenomenology is a methodology with a long and rich history (Husserl, 1859-1938;

Heidegger, 1889-1976; Merleau-Ponty, 1908-1961). The project of phenomenology, as a

methodology for understanding, is predicated on the notion that “human beings make sense of

experience and transform experience into consciousness, both individually and as shared

meaning” (Patton, 2002, p.104). Therefore, phenomenological inquiries often pose the question-

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“What is the meaning, structure, and essence of the lived experience of this phenomenon for this

person or this group of people (Patton, 2002, p. 104). As such, phenomenology, in its traditional

sense, calls for the researcher to intend toward an everyday experience (experienced and

described by the participant) by bracketing her/his presuppositions about the experience so that a

linguistic representation of the essence of the experience can be created.

However, I find the notions of essence and bracketing problematic. I view essence not in

an existential sense but rather to mean “what it is that renders this or that particular experience its

special significance” (Van Manen, 1990, p.32). Essence, then, does not necessarily mean the

ethereal quality of an experience. Instead, it may be conceptualized as,

a linguistic construction, a description of a phenomenon... that is construed so that

the structure of a lived experience is revealed to us in such a fashion that we are

now able to grasp the nature and significance of this experience in a hitherto

unseen way (p.39).

Despite VanManen’s (1990) description of essence, the word still conjures up the image

of a clear sphere floating in space: solid, unmoving, unchanging. As I believe all experience is

fleeting, I prefer the metaphorical image of a ‘shooting star’. The star (or more accurately the

space debris) represents the phenomenon the researcher is intending toward (in this case

reflection) and the streak of light forming the tail of the ‘falling star’ the trace of the

phenomenon that is analyzed and synthesized. Therefore, I align myself with Sumara’s (1996)

conceptualization of trace as “ a binding, a boundary, and a map” (p.60) which allows me to

interact with (1) my participant, (2) the artifacts of our interaction, and (3) the conditions under

which the interactions and artifacts were created with the understanding that it is my experience

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of Dana’s described experience of reflection that I am analyzing and from which meaning was

created.

As noted earlier, bracketing is traditionally associated with phenomenology. Bracketing

is a method in which the researcher sets aside his or her current understandings as he or she

analyzes and interprets the phenomenon of interest (Moustakas, 1994) in an effort to preclude

those understandings from shading the possible meaning to be created. To me, the traditional

phrase ‘bracketing presuppositions’ calls to mind a lobotomy, a surgery during which the top of

my skull is sliced open and the part of brain that ‘knows’ anything about reflection is removed.

But where is that part of my brain? I identify as a reflective person. Through the course of this

study I have helped the participant in the acts of reflection. I reflected with the participant as we

had conversations about her experience of reflection. I reflected on our conversations and

reflected on the descriptions of what it is like for her to reflect! I brought to these acts all that I

know about reflection. I consulted countless theoretical writings about reflection. I replayed my

own multiple and varied experiences of reflection in an effort to understand Dana’s experience. I

don’t know how to ‘bracket’ those understandings.

Therefore, I align myself with Gadamer’s writings on philosophical hermeneutics (1976),

in particular his description of prejudices and the role they play in understanding. Prejudices for

Gadamer are not “unjustified and erroneous so that they inevitably distort the truth” (p.9).

Rather, prejudices are precisely what allows us to experience the world. I used my prejudices

about reflection to enter into conversation with these texts about reflection (the transcribed

conversations with Dana, my experiences of working with Dana, theoretical writings about

reflection) with the intention of wanting to hear something new.

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My prejudices and current understandings about reflection put me in a particular place. It

is from this place that I set my original horizon for this study. Gadamer (1997), writes that

to have an horizon" means not being limited to what is nearby, but to being

able to see beyond it...[W]orking out of the hermeneutical situation means the

achievement of the right horizon of inquiry for the questions evoked by the encounter

with tradition. (p. 302)

An image comes to mind. I am standing on a cliff overlooking the ocean, in the far

distance, where the water meets the sky, I imagine Dana’s experience with reflection to be

placed. I set my horizon, my gaze, at the onset of this study somewhere in between, say several

miles from shore. In conversations with Dana about her experience of reflection and in

conversations with the transcripts of those conversations, I experienced a “fusion of horizons”

The cliff is my encounter with tradition (both the empirical literature discussed in my literature

review and the theoretical writings about reflection). My gaze at the onset of this inquiry was set

at a place slightly beyond tradition as a result of the understandings I created from hermeneutical

engagement with the literature. And the “fusion of horizons” occurred through hermeneutical

engagement with the texts created for this study. My “fusion of horizons” is represented in the

Understandings section of this dissertation.

Although I make clear my current understandings about reflection later in this

chapter, I understand that I can never fully know the extent to which a pre-understanding

shades interpretation. Gadamer (1976) writes, “Reflection on a given pre-understanding

brings before me something that otherwise happens behind my back. Something- but not

everything” (p. 38). However, in an attempt to make as transparent as possible my pre-

understandings, I describe them below.

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Pre-understandings

When I get up on this stage in front of you, I am not alone.

I am crowded by all the people from my life. These people are my rainbows.

Maya Angelou

John Dewey (1933), in his seminal work How We Think, articulated modes of thinking,

among them, was reflection. Dewey wrote about both the dispositions conducive to engaging in

reflective thought and the phases of reflective thought. Dewey believed that attitudes can either

open the way to learning or block it (Rogers, 2002). The dispositions necessary to open the way

to reflection are wholeheartedness, directness, open-mindedness, responsibility, and readiness.

Wholeheartedness is characterized by a genuine enthusiasm for the matter at hand. Directness,

as explained by Rogers (p.860), is “an attitude of trust in the validity of one’s own experience

without spending a lot of time worrying about the judgment of others.” Open-mindedness is

defined by a willingness to entertain different perspectives and to be open to the “possibility of

error even in the beliefs that are dearest to us” (p. 30). Responsibility refers to the real-life

applications of our wholeheartedness, directness, and open-mindedness. Finally, readiness is the

combination of the prior four attitudes and characterizes the person who is ready to engage in

reflective thought. I used my understanding of dispositions related to reflective thought as I

determined who to ask to be a participant in this study.

For Dewey, there exists phases within the reflective act. In the pre-reflective phase, one

has an experience in which dissonance is felt. Thinking then turns to reflection as the person

experiences,


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factual material;





I believe reflection is begun by a feeling of dissonance. I operationalize dissonance as a

misalignment of one’s beliefs, thoughts, words, and/or actions. For example, in an experience,

one would feel dissonance when what one was doing (action, words) was different than what one

believed she/he should be doing (beliefs, thoughts). My preunderstandings about dissonance are

informed by the following ideas from the literature on dissonance: (1) the idea that a lack of

choice prevents dissonance from occurring (Zanna & Copper, 1974), (2) in high-choice

situations, dissonance is experienced only if adverse consequences occur (Linder, Copper &

Jones, 1967), (3) dissonance occurs when a person believes they are responsible for the adverse

consequence (Cooper, 2007), and (4) dissonance is experienced as discomfort (Elliot & Divine,

1994), and because of this discomfort, the human tendency is to justify ones actions that resulted

in the dissonance rather than change their beliefs in a way that would ‘generate fruitful and

testable hypotheses’. I used these ideas about dissonance and its role in the reflective process to

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create the structure of the teaching cycles. However, I also remained open to other possibilities

of how dissonance might have been experienced by Dana.

After an experience of dissonance, Dewey (1933) writes about five additional phases. In

this writing, Dewey emphasizes the scientific method. However, if this description seems overly

systematic, he cautions us,

It means that scientific method provides a working pattern of the way in which and the

conditions under which experiences are used to lead ever onward and outward. Adaptation of the

method to individuals of various degrees of maturity is a problem for the educator, and the

constant factors in the problem are the formation of ideas, acting upon ideas, observation of the

conditions which result, and organization of facts and ideas for future use (1938, p.111-112).”

These ideas speak of process over product. The phrase ‘ever onward and outward’

suggests to me a perpetual movement and growth. Additionally, I understand the above quote to

mean that reflection cannot be taken for granted. Simply following the scientific method during

thinking will not necessarily result in an organization of ideas that will inform future experience.

In this way, it is important that reflection is supported based on the needs of the student. For this

study, I used the above phases of reflection to help guide my interpretation of the data while

simultaneously remaining open to the possibility of new insights into the reflective process

and/or additional phases not yet understood.

I believe that to reflect in isolation tends to recreate and cement one’s currently held

beliefs rather than create new meanings and possibilities from experience. For pre-service

teachers, to reflect in isolation often means relying on their ‘apprenticeship of observation’

(Lortie, 1975) of the numerous experiences with teaching and learning they have had as students

themselves. This is not a negative condition per se, in fact, it is precisely the prejudices pre-

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service teachers have about teaching and learning that are necessary for them to enter into a

conversation (Gadamer, 1976) with their field experience. However, I argue that the knowledge

about teaching and learning from their ‘apprenticeship of observation’ is not adequate for

making “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.) about teaching and learning.

I believe that in order to make ‘warranted assertabilities’ from field experiences,

interaction with a knowledgable other (Vygotsky, 1978) is needed to mediate the old, that which

is too familiar to be the impetus for dissonance, and the new, that which is too unfamiliar to be

noticed. For example, the ‘old’ in Dana’s field experiences was a teacher centered approach

where the teacher does most of the talking and presenting. When confronted with these practices

during her field experiences, Dana did not initially experience any dissonance as they were so

familiar to her. As her knowledgeable other, however, I placed emphasis on this aspect, primarily

through questioning, so as to encourage dissonance. In this manner I attended to pointing out that

which may have been to ‘old’ for Dana to recognize as problematic. When I was successful in

creating dissonance, then thinking could turn to reflection. Likewise, the ‘new’ in Dana’s field

experiences was be the analysis of formative assessment data to make instructional decisions.

This idea and practice was too new for Dana to notice when it was absent and/or mis-

appropriated in their field experiences. I understood my role as knowledgeable other as one to

place emphasis and encourage dissonance so as to propel reflection. I operationalized my role as

knowledgable other as a member of the teaching community of practice (theory/research about

teaching and learning, collaborating teacher, university supervisor) who draws from my

experience and theoretical understandings to guide Dana in the reflection process as we (Dana

and myself) constructed meaning from her field experiences.

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The need for interaction with a knowledgable other also stems from Dewey’s (1933)

writings about the roles judgment and analysis/synthesis play in the reflective process. Part of

reflecting on experiences is using previously constructed theory to select or reject the pertinent

aspects of an experience. These judgments or discernment play a critical role in knowing, as

Dewey writes, “… what to let go as of no account; what to eliminate as irrelevant; what to retain

as conducive to the outcome; what to emphasize as a clew to the difficulty” (p. 123). In this way,

I provided support and guidance as Dana reflected on her field experiences by helping to discern

which aspects of her experience emphasis ought to be placed. I believe exercising judgment with

a ‘knowledgable other’ is part of the process of reflection. For example, during our reflection

conversations which took place during the teaching cycles, Dana would provide evidence that

she judged to be indicative of an effective literacy practice about which she was learning.

Sometimes the evidence she provided was accurate and so I was able to acknowledge her

developing understandings in a positive way (i.e. ‘Exactly, that is precisely an example of a

comprehensive approach to literacy instruction’). Other times, the evidence she provided was

inaccurate and so as I was able to clarify some of the nuances of effective literacy practice (i.e.

‘What does the pillar meaning is central actually look like in a classroom?’).

Intimately related to judgment is analysis and synthesis. For Dewey, these are not

considered dichotomous concepts. Analysis means to place emphasis on certain aspects of an

experience rather than the traditional meaning ‘to take apart’. Synthesis is conceived of as

putting into context (relating back to the whole) that which emphasis was placed (Dewey, 1933).

In other words, in order to reflect on experience, we must be able to make judgments that allow

us to both accept and reject, analyze and synthesize, our experiences. Again, it is the role of the

knowledgeable other to assist the pre-service teacher during the process of reflection. I assisted

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Dana by placing emphasis on certain aspects of her experience and helping, through the use of

questioning to create dialectic tension. It is the ‘staying with’ this tension (both by Dana and

myself) that produced new understandings and ‘warranted assertabilities’ about teaching and

learning. I then assisted Dana, again through questioning, to place the new ‘warranted

assertability’ back into the context of the whole.

The above writing makes as transparent as possible my pre-understandings about

reflection. It is these understandings that shaped my work with Dana and were used to create the

conditions for reflection present in the context within which Dana and I worked together.

Hermeneutic Phenomenology

Hermeneutic phenomenology is an interpretive and reflective methodology. The purpose

of hermeneutic phenomenology is to use one’s pre-understandings in dialectic tension with

textual evidence in the pursuit of understanding and seeing anew a phenomenon. In this section, I

detail how the pieces of textual evidence of Dana’s experience of reflection were created and

analyzed. I also describe how I engaged in the pursuit of understanding by navigating the

heteroglossiac (Bahktin, 1981) waters of language and interpretation.

Hermeneutic Data Creation/Analysis Cycles

In this section of the paper, I have chosen to interweave information about data creation

and analysis rather than separating them under different headings. I made this choice because it

keeps in line with the hermeneutic, phenomenological tradition.

There is an ‘art’ in reading a text but there is also an ‘art’ of constructing a text to read. I

am using the placeholder ‘text’ to mean the dialectic, inter-subjective, interactions and utterances

that result from “the community of interpreters working together in mutually corrective and

collaborative efforts to understand texts and contexts” (Slattery, Krasny, & O’Malley, 2007).

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Specifically, I mean the ‘art’ of engaging in dialectic, inter-subjective conversations with Dana

as we came to describe and make meaning of her experience of reflection. The transcripts of

these conversations about reflection produced the ‘texts’ that I analyzed/synthesized.

I believe both the ‘art’ of constructing texts and the ‘art’ of reading a text and

constructing meaning from a text can be accomplished by approaching text creation and

interpretation aesthetically. Dewey describes the ‘esthetic ideal’ when he writes, “when the past

ceases to trouble and anticipations of the future are not perturbing is a being wholly united with

his [sic] environment and therefore fully alive” (1934, p. 17). I engaged in this research

aesthetically as I refined my awareness of the present moment during the conversations I had

with Dana about reflection.

The above mentioned conversations are different from the conversations Dana and I had

during the Teaching Cycles I described earlier. The Teaching Cycles were the context where I

believe reflection occurred. I needed to detail those cycles, the context, because of the problems I

noticed in the literature. I questioned whether researchers were examining reflection because the

design of the studies did not attend to what I consider to be the important factors of dissonance,

judgment, knowledgeable others, and dialectic tension. Therefore the description of the teaching

cycles demonstrate that reflection occurred and is the phenomenon under study here. However,

in a phenomenology, it is Dana’s experience of reflection that I want to understand and so I

needed her to describe that experience. In order to do so, we had conversations about reflection

and the teaching cycles.

Data creation and analysis (see Appendix E for timeline) specifically occurred as I

engaged in an initial conversation about reflection and Dana’s experience of the teaching cycles

during the the second semester of her final year-long residency experience. I transcribed and

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analyzed the video of that conversation. During the analysis of this conversation, insights

inspired new questions. These questions were asked during additional conversations I had with

Dana. These conversations continued until the data reached adequacy. Charmaz (2005) quoting

Janice Morse writes, “[data adequacy] is operationalized as collecting data until no new

information is obtained” (p.527-528).

In this way, data collection and analysis in this study occurred in tandem. As parts of

reflection became illuminated, I made possible meanings of their appearance in relation to the

whole of reflection. Possible meanings were explored in subsequent conversations with Dana.

Dana and I engaged in three conversations about her experience of reflection and the

teaching cycles. Each conversation lasted approximately an hour. During the first two

conversations we talked about her experience of reflection and what it means for her to ‘stay

with’ dissonance’. Another secondary data source was used to prompt our third conversation.

That data source was a video of a reflective conversation I had with Dana during one of our

teaching cycles. I observed the video while taking notes. Observing, in the hermeneutic,

phenomenological tradition, “involves an attitude of assuming a relation that is as close as

possible while retaining a hermeneutic alertness to situations that allows us to constantly step

back and reflect on the meaning of those situations” (Van Manen, 1990, p.69). While observing

the interactions (which were video recorded) between myself and Dana during the teaching

cycle, I looked for any clue (body language, tone of voice, word choice) that would reveal an

aspect of reflection as Dana and I were actually experiencing reflection. I maintained a four

column log (see Appendix F for an example) indicating the teaching cycle video segment on

which I placed emphasis, a description of what occurred during that segment, my initial

interpretation, and the question I crafted to ask Dana about the segment. The insights made

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during these viewings led to additional questions that I asked during our third conversation

during which Dana and I viewed parts of the teaching cycle reflection conversation video

together.

In order to make meaning from the data, I entered into ‘conversational relation’ (Van

Manen, 1990) with both the phenomenon of reflection and Dana. I conducted thematic analysis

of the three conversations I had with Dana using the selective approach throughout the study

(Van Manen, 1990). After data (three transcribed conversations) were constructed, I underlined

particular phrases and words that appeared to reveal something essential about the process of

reflection. I “horizontalized” the data by treating all aspects of the data as equal (Patton, 2002,

p.486). I then organized the data into meaningful clusters based on coherence (i.e. which phrases

seemed to be representative of same/similar ideas). I eliminated “irrelevant, repetitive, or

overlapping data (Patton, 2002). Next, I textually described the “main thrust of the meaning of

the themes” (Van Manen, 1990, p. 93). Throughout the study I made statements about

developing themes (see Appendix G for the list of initial phrases, meaningful clusters, and

eliminations). I re-entered into conversations with Dana to clarify these statements. This cycle

continued until, as with natural conversations, our utterances “gradually diminish [ed] into a

series of more and more pauses, and finally silence, something has been fulfilled” (Van Manen,

p.99).

In tandem with thematic analysis and clarification, I engaged in collaborative analysis of

tentative themes (Van Manen, 1990). I started the second and third conversation with Dana by

engaging in what Gadamer (1975) calls the “art of testing” (p.330). During this time, we

discussed in what ways the themes did or did not resonate with our experiences of reflection and

we made adjustments as necessary before we continued the conversation.

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After themes which resonated were formulated, I worked to determine incidental from

essential themes. Van Manen, (1990, p. 107) writes,

In determining the universal or essential quality of a theme our concern is to discover

aspects or qualities that make a phenomenon what it is and without which the phenomenon could

not be what it is.

I mulled over each theme and asked “Is this phenomenon still the same if we

imaginatively change or delete this theme from the phenomenon? Does the phenomenon without

this theme lose its fundamental meaning” (p. 107)? See Appendix H for a list of incidental and

essential themes.

The Pursuit of Understanding Within the Hermeneutic Circle

The above process of analysis and synthesis is typical for a phenomenological study.

What hermeneutics has to offer is engagement within the hermeneutic circle to create the

dialectic tension which results in new or fresh insights. However, there is no set of rules or

procedure to accomplish understanding within the hermeneutic circle. Van Manen (1990) offers

practical ways in which a researcher could go about analyzing and synthesizing data from a

phenomenological approach; however, this approach is presupposed by a researcher’s propensity

for receptivity and perception. My ability to maintain a disposition of effortless action

(Slingerland, 2003), to actively receive (Dewey, 1938), to be with (Van Manen, 1990) the

phenomenon, and my interpretation of its parts and whole, determined the understandings that

occurred as a result of this study. My reflective abilities to bring to the fore the

preunderstandings I have about the phenomenon of reflection and pre-service teacher education

helped me ‘be with’ and ‘work through’ the dialectic tensions within the hermeneutic circle. As

so, create a fusion of horizons (Gadamer, 1976).

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The hermeneutic circle is a useful heuristic for understanding how insights are created by

engaging in an hermeneutic phenomenology. The hermeneutic circle “ characterises

interpretation as a recursive and two-way process of considering individual pieces of text

evidence in relation to the whole text” (DeLuca, 2011, p. 312). For this inquiry, I considered the

whole of reflection as I currently understood it in conjunction with the individual pieces of text

created (the transcribed conversations I had with Dana about reflection, the video of myself and

Dana in the process of reflecting together during our teaching cycles, the conversation which

occurred as we revisited that video together). The dialectic tensions that occurred as a result of

interpreting the juxtapositions of parts and whole created understanding. However, within the

hermeneutic circle is a double dialectic (Gadamer, 1976), a relationship between the parts and

the whole and also a relationship between the data and my presuppositions. Below I describe that

relationship.

Bridling Pre-understandings

Higgins (2011), writes about research as aesthetic experience,

Experience exists to the degree to which we are able to let our existing habits and past

meanings fund a new encounter. We need our existing habits to help us frame a

situation as familiar enough to be intelligible, but we also want to remain open to

those aspects of the situation that exceed, challenge, and enrich the categories and

constructs we are bringing to bear (p. 143).

I approached this study with the understanding that my understandings of reflection

colored and framed my interactions with Dana and my ability to remain open to the moments

that ‘exceeded, challenged, and enriched’ my understanding of reflection.

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I detailed my pre-understandings about reflection earlier in this chapter. It is now time to

describe how I worked with my pre-understandings throughout this inquiry. Dahlberg (2006)

refers to the awareness one has of one’s own pre-understandings as ‘bridling’. When conducting

hermeneutic, phenomenological research it is important to ‘bridle’ one’s pre-understandings so

that “we do not understand too quick, too careless, or slovenly, or in other words, that we do not

make definite what is indefinite” (Dahlberg, 2006, p. 16). I kept a ‘bridling’ journal (Vagle,

2010, p.403) throughout the course of this study. In this journal I wrote my beginning

understandings and assumptions about reflection. After each data event, I wrote burning

questions or concerns and reflected on them. This journaling ritual heightened my awareness of

my presuppositions and helped to keep me “actively waiting”, as Dahlburg (2006, p.16) writes,

the appearance of reflection rather than recklessly pursuing my presuppositions. Much like

bridling a horse, the writing in which I engaged in this journal, assisted me to pull back the reins

on my pre-understandings while allowing the horse to move forward. As Chris DeLucca (2013,

personal communication) explained, “bridling allows for intentional movements that are both

responsive yet thoughtful.”

Hermeneutic Windows

The continued ‘fusion of horizons’ about reflection and pre-service teacher education can

occur as others come into relation with the textual artifact (article) I produce as a result of this

inquiry. The creation of hermeneutic windows (Sumara,1996) provides an opportunity for

stakeholders to engage in joint interpretation of a phenomenon (DeLuca, 2011). Hermeneutic

windows are a method of reporting what is traditionally referred to as findings. Sumara (1996)

describes them as,

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“an image to suggest the way in which hermeneutic inquiry can give us access

to horizons of understanding that were previously not there- that is to help us

see what we had not been previously able or willing to see” (p.128).

The hermeneutic windows I present in the next chapter were created by writing through

the dialectic tension (paradox, contradictions) that resulted when the essential themes created

from the data were juxtaposed with theoretical writings and mediated within the hermeneutic

circle through reflection. Through the hermeneutic windows I create, the readers/stakeholders

(other teacher educators) will come into contact with a new horizon and through interpretative

efforts of their own set into motion their own thinking about their presuppositions about

reflection and/or create a fusion of horizons which expands their current understandings about

reflection and pre-service teacher education.

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Chapter Four:

Understandings

Understanding sets free what is hidden from view by layers of tradition, prejudice, and even

conscious evasion.

Slattery, Krasny, & O’Malley (2007)

Introduction

In the prior review, I used Dewey’s (1933) concepts of dissonance, judgment,

knowledgeable others, and dialectic tension to explore parameters of reflection as a communal

process of creating “warranted assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) from experience. Notably, I

found that researchers primarily define reflection as thinking about a past experience rather than

a specific mode of thought, prompted by dissonance in experience, which creates “warranted

assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) about teaching and learning. I presented that perhaps much

of the empirical literature researchers have created so far in the name of reflection has pointed

toward reflection but seems to not have worked with the complexities of reflection as a

communal process (Branscombe & Schneider, 2013) which involves judgment, dissonance, and

dialectic tension (Dewey, 1933). In other words, researchers have leveled the products (written

documents, conversations) that result when pre-service teachers are required or asked to reflect

but the actual process of reflection with pre-service teachers seems to remain hidden.

Therefore, I engaged in an hermeneutic phenomenology, a methodology that is sensitive

to the experience of a phenomenon (Van Manen, 1990) and is concerned with understanding and

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seeing anew (Gadamer, 1976). I inquired into the experience of reflection as lived by Dana, a

pre-service teacher with whom I worked. This study was guided by the primary question: What

is Dana’s experience of dialectic reflection with a knowledgeable other? What new insights

about reflection can be created by juxtaposing her described experience of reflection with multi-

disciplinary theoretical writings?

Hermeneutic Windows

In this chapter, I engage in dialectic writing as a way to interpret the findings of this

study. It is writing through the dissonance I created when I juxtaposed Dana’s described

experience of reflection with theoretical writings about reflection which developed fresh insights

into the phenomenon of reflection. Those insights (windows) became framed as I created titles

for them. The titles of the hermeneutic windows I present in this chapter are: (1) (Dis)positions:

Tendencies Toward Temporary Places; (2) ‘Staying With’ Dissonance: The Roles Judgment and

Knowledgeable Others Play in the Phases of Reflection; and (3) Writing: A Tool for Propelling

Dana Into and Through Reflection).

I believe dialectic writing is key in the creation of hermeneutic windows. Therefore, the

presentation of what is traditionally termed ‘findings’ and ‘discussion’ looks quite different in

this chapter. There is no distinct line between ‘findings’ and ‘discussion‘’ because it is the

interplay between the two which creates new understandings. Therefore, within each

hermeneutic window the reader will find raw data mingling with theoretical writings and my

own experiences and thinking about reflection in no concrete, distinct order. I believe the

creation of hermeneutic windows in not linear. Therefore, it is my intention that the reader would

read through and interact with an entire hermeneutic window before judging the adequacy of the

presentation.

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The creation of hermeneutic windows provides an opportunity for stakeholders to engage

in joint interpretation of a phenomenon (DeLuca, 2011). The three hermeneutic windows below

(1) (Dis)positions: Tendencies Toward Temporary Places; (2) ‘Staying With’ Dissonance: The

Roles Judgment and Knowledgeable Others Play in the Phases of Reflection; and (3) Writing: A

Tool for Propelling Dana Into and Through Reflection) are intended to frame traces (Sumara,

1996) of reflection as experienced by Dana and provide discussion and my interpretation of those

traces. The metaphorical image of a ‘shooting star’ can be used to think about traces. The star (or

more accurately the space debris) represents the phenomenon the researcher is intending toward

(in this case reflection) and the streak of light forming the tail of the ‘falling star’ the trace of the

phenomenon that is analyzed and synthesized. Therefore, the hermeneutic windows I present

below are “ a binding, a boundary, and a map” (Sumara, 1996, p.60) which allowed me to

interact with (1) my participant, (2) the artifacts of our interaction, and (3) the conditions under

which the interactions and artifacts were created with the understanding that it is my experience

of Dana’s described experience of reflection that I am analyzing and from which meaning was

created. My experience with her experience is but a trace of reflection.

As such, I create three windows through which the reader can ‘see’ the trace of reflection.

It is understood and necessary that the reader will engage in her/his own process of interpretation

and create her/his own understandings about reflection as a result. In this way, ever-new

understandings can occur.

(Dis)positions: Tendencies Toward Temporary Places

Dana has had many experiences, in many different contexts, with many different

knowledgeable others in which her tendencies toward reflection have found a place. As revealed

below, she spoke of influential relationships within which she enacted her open-mindedness,

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wholeheartedness, responsibility, and directness (Dewey, 1933). She talked about a time when

her grandfather was dying of cancer and he expressed his readiness and desire to pass. However,

because physician assisted suicide was illegal, he was forced to suffer through the last months of

his life. Dana recalled this experience to be the impetus of many reflective conversations she had

with her then high-school teacher. She recalled,

D: We would have discussions about it and he would challenge me... he would

say things like what about ok so your grandfather when he was going to die he was

suffering right? What about the child who is born who is going to have a terrible life?

Is he going to suffer? Has a disease? Never gonna be able to do xy and z? Is never

going to be... should we just kill him? What if they are in pain should we kill them

then?... What if we know they are going to be in pain their whole lives should we kill

them then? Should we kill them when they can’t consent to being a suicide? When do

we draw the line? So thinking deeply like that about my ethics and about how I felt

about that issue I think that was maybe like the start and then loved that feeling of

like challenging myself.

It was in relation with her high-school teacher about a topic they both wholeheartedly

cared about that Dana was able to enact an open-mind as she considered new ideas and

questions. She stayed in a place of responsibility as she considered her role in the consequences

that would result from her thinking. In this relationship, she enacted the dispositions associated

with reflective thinking.

Indeed, much is made of a person’s dispositions in relation to their ability to engage in

reflective thought. Dewey (1933) writes about the importance of open-mindedness,

wholeheartedness, and responsibility for reflective thought to occur. Rogers (2002), adds to these

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qualities a sense of directness. She writes, directness is “an attitude of trust in the validity of

one’s own experience without spending a lot of time worrying about the judgment of others”

(p.860). Theoretically, it seems as though these dispositions are a part of who a person is. These

dispositions open the way for reflective thinking. This suggests that these dispositions pre-

suppose reflection. They are there. They exist. Without them reflection does not occur.

However, Dana’s experience of reflection is imbued with habits of being and habits of

thinking that are fluid and continually formed/revised as a result of interactions with others.

What if these (dis)positions are not positions but rather tendencies toward temporary places? She

tends toward a position of open-mindedness. She tends toward a position of responsibility. She

tends toward a position of whole-heartedness. She tends toward. This does not mean that she is.

Her (dis)positions toward reflection shape and are shaped by her interactions with others during

reflective acts. They are fluid. Dana tends toward a position of open-mindedness in relation with

others. She goes toward that position but this does not mean she is guaranteed that space.

In a conversation we had as we were watching a video of one of her teaching cycles, I

stopped the recording at a particular place. In the video, I was presenting Dana with my

interpretation of a segment of her lesson (a guided reading lesson she was having with

Kindergarteners) which ran counter to her initial judgment of the impact she was having on

student learning. Below is an excerpt of the conversation we had during that that teaching cycle.

A: Let’s look closely at the pillar: kids need to read and write a lot. When I

viewed your video, I kept track of how many minutes the students were reading

because sometimes it feels like they are reading a lot but until you really look at it

you don’t know. I have from 9:40 to 13:10 so that is a little over three minutes...

D: That is not much

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A: Yeah so even though the lesson was designed that the students were going

to do the reading when we really look at it they didn’t do much

D: So what kind of like should I have gotten another book

A: Well let’s look at that because I’m interested in your thoughts about

this...they were able to read the script Pete’s a Pizza [a reader’s theater script we had

used with the kindergarteners in a previous lesson that we co-taught] which is a high-

level text with just a little bit of support with the echo reading but I think most of

them were able to read that text easily. How did that text compare to that level four

text you are using here?

D: Um..I guess that the level four text would be a lot less than Pete’s a Pizza

A: And as I was watching the video something wasn’t setting with me.

Although their assessment data show their instructional level as four. I’m seriously

doubting it. They are probably capable of reading more sophisticated text.

D: So they are not challenged enough huh? Well I talked to my collaborating

teacher and she said they were at a level three at the time so I just took that and

worked with it but maybe I should have given them a running record.

In this segment, Dana was clearly tending toward open- mindedness. She was open to my

interpretation of the lesson segment. She was being hospitable “to new themes, facts, ideas,

questions” (Dewey, 1933, p.30) but she was not necessarily taking them at face value. She was

asking questions. She was wholeheartedly absorbed in intellectually exploring the questions I

asked. When I stopped the video and asked her what was keeping her with me, rather than

providing short affirmative responses or changing he subject she said,

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D: Maybe its because I know your motive and I know my goal. See your

motive is get me to be a better teacher and my goal is to be a better teacher. So I

know, that no matter what, your motive is not to judge me; your motive is to get me

to be a better teacher. To get me to reflect on my own.

A: Just to learn from this experience

D: And you tell people [other pre-service teachers] that. But I don't think they

take it to heart. So I just think you

A: Yeah that makes sense

D: And plus I don’t care at all if you think I’m a good teacher or not because I

know my role as an intern is to grow. It’s not to be a good teacher. It’s to learn and be

a better teacher.

Dana was in a place of open-mindedness during that taped reflective conversation which

occurred during a teaching cycle. She attributed that openness to an alignment of our motives.

Her perception of my motive was wanting her to learn from this experience to become a better

teacher and it was consonant with her motive to learn from this experience to become a better

teacher. Being in relation with each other, created a space for mine and Dana’s tendencies

toward open-mindedness, wholeheartedness, responsibility, and directness to temporarily be

placed.

However, not all relationships create a space in which Dana’s tendencies toward

reflection find a place to be. When Dana described the typical conversations she had with her

collaborating teacher about her teaching she said,

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D: I hate when people accept. Like I am always asking Ms. W. for feedback.

She says ‘Oh that was a great lesson. I love how you did this this and this...’

Thanks... I don’t need that.

In the above description of being in relation with her collaborating teacher, Dana’s

tendency toward wholeheartedness did not find a place. Dana did not actively follow a line of

thinking and engage with new ideas or questions. And reflection did not occur. I do not know

Ms. W’s tendencies toward reflection but I do know that being in relation with each other in that

moment did not create a place for Dana’s tendencies to temporarily be. Perhaps the motives of

both people in this relationship were not consonant. I understand Dana’s motive to be that of

wanting to be a better teacher, to learn from her experience rather than to show she is a ‘good’

teacher. Maybe Ms. W’s motive was to encourage Dana, to give her positive feedback. So

although Dana tends toward wholeheartedness, she is not guaranteed a space in which she can

position herself as wholeheartedly engaged in making meaning from her field experiences

through reflection. So she says, “thanks” and moves on. In other words, in relation with her

collaborating teacher, Dana does not engage in the process of making warranted assertabilities

(reflection) about teaching and learning. She does not ask questions. Dana seems to shut off the

reflection process by simply saying thanks and moving on. It appears as though, in relation with

her collaborating teacher, Dana’s tendency toward wholeheartedness does not find a location.

Rather, Dana seems to become dismissive of the experience and does not wholeheartedly pursue

trying to make warranted assertabilities from the experience.

I believe there are possibilities present here; there are certainly questions. Even when a

pre-service teacher such as Dana has the (dis)positions of open-mindedness, wholeheartedness,

responsibility, and directness, it does not mean that she/he will find a place for those

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(dis)positions to be enacted. Are we as teacher educators working in relation with pre-service

teachers to create spaces for those tendencies to temporarily be enacted? Are researchers

examining (dis)positions as they are enacted in relationships? Are the motives of those in relation

to each other in these spaces consonant? And what if the motives are consonant? What if both

people engaged in a dialogue enter into relation with the motive of encouraging each other and

making each other feel good about their experiences? What then? Does that lead to “warranted

assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938 p.) about teaching and learning that are characteristic of reflection

such as ‘when children spend a lot of time reading books that are at their appropriate

instructional level they tend to progress in areas of literacy more quickly than those who are not

reading a lot in appropriate leveled text?’ A warranted assertability is not an opinion. Dewey

(1933) writes,



warrant; that is as ground of belief. (p.11)

Some researchers suggest that although pre-service teachers enjoy positive spaces where

they get support and advice from others (Shoffner, 2009) they do not seem to engage in what

researchers call high levels of reflection (Bean & Stevens, 2002; Harland & Wondra, 2011). I

would argue, as I made the case in my literature review, that they most likely are not engaging in

reflection at all. Are the two people in conversation with each other positioning themselves as

wholehearted, open-minded, responsible, and direct?

This seems important. It is not only that the motives of the people in relation are

consonant but also that the motives are consonant with the purposes of reflection: to create

warranted assertabilities from experience so as to inform future action (Dewey, 1933). To reflect

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on field experiences in relation with a knowledgable other means all parties enter into that space

with the motive of learning from experience rather than the motive of proving one’s ‘goodness’

or self-worth, or only providing encouragement. This is as true for the teacher educator as it is

for the pre-service teacher.

In what ways can teacher educators understand their own motives in their relations with

pre-service teachers? What can teacher educators do to make their motives clear? In one of our

conversations, Dana, when describing how she perceived others’ as understanding my motives

said,

D: When you talk to the whole group and you say you know I’m just here to

help you grow. Things like that. Maybe you should say something to the effect of you

know when you are teaching, do you want your kids to be just feel like happy the

whole time or do you want them to feel challenged?

A: What do you think most of your peers would say to that?

D: I hope they would say..I think our group would say they want them to

feel...

disequilibrium but maybe if you phrase it like that. You know, you say I’m in

the same boat. I want you guys to feel challenged. You know so if I say something

that makes you feel like “ohhh that hurts” then that is a good thing. And you need to

cater that like...

A: It is a sign of learning when you feel that. It is a sign that you are just about

ready to learn something important. And maybe [I should] be explicit

D: But when you talk to the group you say, “I want you to feel comfortable”

and “I don’t want you to think that I am doing this for a grade.”

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A: I see what you are saying. So you all need to know that when I am saying

things like “feel comfortable” that in my mind I’m thinking “comfortable with being

uncomfortable.” That is what I really mean. But it is not coming across this way. [It’s

coming across] like let’s just be a happy family and it doesn’t matter.

D: But then they think, ‘oh she wants me to feel comfortable’ and then when

they don’t feel comfortable they think, ‘Oh this must be going wrong.’

I understand my motive during the reflective conversations I have with the pre-service

teachers with whom I work. My motive is centered on the purpose of reflection: to create

warranted assertabilities from experience to inform future action. However, understanding my

own motive is not enough to be in relation with an other and create spaces for reflective

(dis)positions to be enacted. Dana reminds me that I need to be explicit and clear about my

motives. And also to connect with what the preservice teachers might be feeling and what their

motives are.

However, simply stating one’s motive does not necessarily result in an other’s believing

one’s motive. I recognize that my actions must support my stated intention. Dana recalled the

importance of this as she spoke of feeling comfortable when I presented evidence from a video

of her teaching that upon further examination revealed a lack of student understanding. She said,

D: ...now if you were saying like what you did was totally wrong. And here is

how you need to fix it. But you you have never done that so I don’t [feel annoyed]

In the above excerpt, Dana is articulating why she felt comfortable when I created

dissonance by presenting her with my interpretation (the students were not reading a lot) of her

experience. She is saying that I was not judging her teaching as being wrong and telling her how

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to fix it. Rather, I was pointing toward an aspect of her experience that we could discuss in order

to make a warranted assertability about teaching and learning.

Additionally, being in relation with pre-service teachers as we reflect on their field

experiences is not a one-way street. Therefore, it is important to consider the following

questions: In what ways can pre-service teachers understand their own motives as they relate to

reflecting on their field experiences? How can they become aware of alignment/misalignment

between their motives and their actions?

The above hermeneutic window showed reflection to be saturated with complex

interrelations. I see all of these ideas as lines of potential inquiry into the relationships among

(dis) positions (open-mindedness, wholeheartedness, responsibility, directness), reflective acts,

and pre-service teacher/knowledgeable other dyads. Next, I present the second hermeneutic

window through which to see a fresh view of reflection.

‘Staying With’ Dissonance: The Roles Judgment and Knowledgeable Others Play in the

Phases of Reflection

I had an interesting experience during the third conversation I had with Dana. During this

conversation Dana and I were watching a video of one of our teaching cycles. In this particular

teaching cycle, we were watching a video of Dana teaching a sequence of guided reading

lessons. In this teaching cycle, Dana was exploring the idea of having children read during

guided reading rather than her reading the text aloud to the children. At one point during the

teaching cycle I noted the amount of time the students actually spent reading and this caused

Dana to experience dissonance. I stopped the video of our teaching cycle at this point and I asked

Dana how it felt:

A: Ok so here I am saying that this is my attempt to create dissonance for you

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D: and you did that in a heart beat

A: Ok how does that feel

D: ahh man it feels like how could I, how could I do that?

A: You are getting red right now

D: These poor children all they need to know how to do is read and I am only

letting them do 3 minutes.

We watched what she did after she had an immediate physical (face blushing) reaction to

the feeling of dissonance. Her actions were conducive to reflection. She stayed with the

dissonance. She intellectually pursued, with me, the idea I presented. But in my experience with

other pre-service teachers this is not always the case. I have seen others shut down after they

experience dissonance. Indeed, in a prior study (Gelfuso & Dennis, 2013, in review), Danielle

and I found pre-service teachers either changing the topic or providing short agreeable responses

(yes, ok, alright) when feeling cognitive dissonance. Neither of which are actions conducive to

‘staying with’ the dissonance long enough and skillfully enough to intellectually pursue the

creation of warranted assertabilities. I wonder what effect might occur if in the moment when

dissonance seems to have shut down thinking, I point out the pre-service teachers’ reaction and

how that reaction runs counter to the motive of learning from experience. Or, what if we revisit a

conversation, much like I did with Dana, and think about together what impact that reaction to

dissonance had on her/his/our learning and brainstorm possibilities for ‘staying with‘ dissonance

in the future.

The point is, can the (dis)positions conducive to reflective thinking be cultivated by

creating spaces for those tendencies to find a place and by reflecting on the way we reflect. Not

which came first, the (dis)positions or the reflection but rather how do reflection and (dis)

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positions of open-mindedness, wholeheartedness, responsibility, and directness exist in

interdependent relation with one another? And indeed if they [(dis) positions and reflection] do

exist in interdependent relation with one another can a “fusion of horizons” (Gadamer, 1976) be

created when teacher educators and pre-service teachers reflect about how they reflect. In this

way, is it possible to negotiate the disparate motives people sometimes have as they engage in

conversations about an experience?

During our conversations, Dana and I explored her experiences of dissonance. She

experienced dissonance when she was thinking about her field experiences alone, when she was

having conversations with her peers, and when she was having conversations with me during our

teaching cycles. However, these experiences of dissonance were not the same. Some became the

impetus for reflection as Dewey (1933) would suggest, while others seemed to lead to

unwarranted assertabilities or even nowhere.

Dana talked about experiencing dissonance when she was in the moment teaching

students and when she was observing her collaborating teacher teach. In both of these situations,

Dana resolved the dissonance by herself. When she described a time when she felt dissonance

during her own teaching she said,

D: It is like disequilibrium. It’s like if I see something. If a kid is trying his

hardest struggling and still doesn’t get it, then I have to figure out how I can go about

it in a different way to make him understand whatever it is. And just thinking about

what the things that I have tried and things that other people have tried and thinking

about where what step in his learning was missing compared to the other students that

got it right away

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A: But all of these things are going in your head while you are actually

engaged with the student?

D: Yeah I think so.

In this description, I see that Dana had an experience of dissonance. A student was not

responding to her instruction the way she had anticipated. It appears as though this experience of

dissonance propelled her thinking into the next phases of reflection.

Dewey (1933) writes about the phases of reflection in which after dissonance is

experienced the person uses,


(2) an intellectualization of the difficulty or perplexity that has been felt (directly

experienced) into a problem to be solved, a question for which the answer must be sought;

(3) the use of one suggestion after another as a leading idea, or hypothesis, to initiate

and guide observation and other operations in collection of factual material;

(4) the mental elaboration of the idea or supposition as an idea or supposition

(reasoning, in the sense in which reasoning is a part, not the whole, of inference); and


Dana’s mind did appear to leap forward to find a possible solution. She ran through her

memory of things she has tried, things other people have tried, searching for a ‘fix’. I do not see

evidence of Dana progressing through the other phases of reflection. Was she able to

intellectualize the difficulty that she ‘felt’? I think she attempted to do so when she described

thinking about “what step in his learning was missing compared to the other student who got it

right away”. She created a question, “what step in his learning was missing” but is this an

intellectualization of the ‘felt’ problem that will lead to fruitful inquiry and ‘warranted

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assertabilities’ about teaching a learning? Is not “what step in his learning was missing” a deficit

model of teaching and learning? Did Dana place emphasis (judgment) on the pertinent aspect of

her experience? Was it a “step in his learning” that was “missing” or was there a misstep in her

attempt to build upon his current abilities and understanding? Was she aware of his current

abilities? What does it mean to “get it right away?”

On the surface it appears as though Dana proceeded to phase three (the use of one

suggestion after another as a leading idea, or hypothesis, to initiate and guide observation and

other operations in collection of factual material) as she thought about what she has tried and

what others have tried in an attempt to create an hypothesis “to go about it in a different way to

make him understand.” But when considering the role of judgment (Dewey, 1933), I wonder

what Dana was relying on to discern whether what she tried and what others have tried was even

applicable to this child’s learning. And the fact that something was tried does not equate with

‘done with quality and intention.’ I asked her about where her espoused firm beliefs about

teaching came from and she said,

D: It definitely wasn't from my first two years of undergrad. I don't know part

of me wants to say cause I struggled a lot in elementary. I was a terrible student um I

don't know. Cause I can barely remember elementary school never mind being able to

take what I saw there and apply it to my mature brain now. I mean that doesn't make

any sense. And I don’t have any experiences in classrooms other than these two years.

Maybe I have no idea. That is kind of scary to think about that. I have these super

firm beliefs and I don't even know where they came from.

That is scary. And well documented (Lortie,1975). Pre-service teachers often rely on

their apprenticeship of observation when attempting to make sense of their field experiences

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alone. On what else would they rely? It is precisely the current understandings pre-service

teachers have about teaching and learning that are necessary for them to enter into a conversation

(Gadamer, 1976) with their field experiences. Indeed,

Only the support of familiar and common understanding makes possible the venture into

the alien, the lifting up of something out of the alien, and thus the broadening and enrichment of

our own experience of the world (Gadamer, 1976, p. 15).

Pre-service teachers relying on their apprenticeship of observation (Lortie, 1975) alone is

scary. Pre-service teachers relying on their apprenticeship of observation in relation with a

knowledgeable other presents possibilities for ‘fusions of horizons’ (Gadamer, 1976). A

‘broadening and enrichment’ of experience. Understanding.

Dana experiences dissonance when she is teaching and she relies on her apprenticeship of

observation to attempt to problematize the experience and search for possible solutions. She

relies on her judgment and background knowledge to attempt to reflect. But she does not engage

in reflection. She thinks about how to make it better but does not ‘stay with’ the dissonance

skillfully enough to intellectually pursue and create “warranted assertabilities” about teaching

and learning. How could she? She is left alone with nothing to provoke thought in new

directions. It seems an experience of dissonance does not inevitably result in reflection.

Dana not only attempts to think through her felt dissonance alone. She also engages in

voluntary conversations with her peers about societal issues related to school and teaching and

learning. When describing her conversations with a peer she recalled,

D: Tanya and I we tutor [middle schoolers] at a very low economic school.

Every day we get into my car and we just talk about what went on cause we are with

different groups. We talk about what went on. We talk about what strategies we can

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try next time. Um and we talk about you know why these kids are at a first grade

reading level? Why do they hate school? Why do they hate adults? Why why does the

community look like trash cause we drive right through it and that is what we see.

And why are they walking out of school at dismissal and smoking a cigarette in 6th

grade? And so we talk about a lot of these things but it is still different...like with

Tanya and I we have a really close relationship we have a lot of the same ideals so it

is very easy for me to talk to her about certain things.

A: Those are good questions. When I heard you list them they seem like those

bigger philosophical questions. So you are saying with a particular peer who you have

a relationship with you guys do reflect or have conversations about these bigger

philosophical things but then I heard you say but it is still a little bit different than this

space [the place where we have our teaching cycles] and I am wondering what comes

of this? So you have these great conversations but do you...

D: That’s the difference. That’s the difference. I don’t have any concrete

beliefs of my own to call my own to say that I can defend them about any of that

stuff. I know that I don’t. I wish I could change it but I don’t have any idea about any

of it. I don’t even know if I am democrat or a republican.

Dana and her friend Tanya experienced dissonance about significant societal problems.

These are the topics and concerns researchers and teacher educators view as ripe for critical

reflection. And Dana and Tanya do begin the reflection process. They experienced dissonance.

They used their judgment to intellectualize the felt dissonance and formed questions. But they

did not ‘stay with’ the dissonance. In relation with each other, they created a space in which their

tendencies toward wholeheartedness and openness were enacted. This allowed for the

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development of questions. But it seems as though responsibility and directness did not find a

place in this space. Dana said, “I don’t have any concrete beliefs of my own to call my own to

say that I can defend them about any of that stuff. I know that I wish I could change it but I don’t

have any idea about any of it.” This could mean that she does not feel responsible in the

Deweyian sense for the consequences of her thinking about these matters. Does she recognize

that what she thinks about why the neighborhood looks like trash impacts her interactions with

children who come from that neighborhood? When Dana notes that she doesn’t have any

concrete beliefs that she could defend, I believe she has not positioned herself in a place of

directness (Rogers, 2001), in which she sees the validity of her own experience as a place for

understanding to be created. Could being in relation with a knowledgeable other have helped

Dana position herself as responsible and direct, and as such sustained the conversation through

the reflective phases?

So even when Dana is not alone, when she is thinking with another about felt dissonance,

she is not necessarily reflecting. This is also her experience as she talked about a conversation

she had with a peer who asked her to give advice about a lesson she had taught that Dana

observed. She recalled,

D: ...at the end of the lesson she [Charlene] always says “Ok so how did that

go?What can I work on?” Stuff like that. And I tell her. I look at my notes and

I say “OK here I thought you could of done this a little differently.” Here is

why um that I guess that is reflecting? Because I am reflecting on her teaching

and then when we talk about it and she justifies why she did whatever she did

and then I think about that and I say “You know what that actually seems

logical.” And it makes me think more about it. I don't think that I am always

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right ever. I know that there are always better ways to do everything. But I

often think that my ways are better than other people’s ways. But it is nice

when somebody will stand up for their own ways and challenge me to think

about whatever I'm thinking.

In this recollection, Dana used the term reflecting but is that what was occurring here?

When Charlene asked how did the lesson go and Dana provided a list of things she could have

done differently, I believe Charlene experienced dissonance. Perhaps what she thought was a

‘good’ lesson was being presented as otherwise. It seems as though Charlene then justified her

actions. This is in line with cognitive dissonance theory. Dissonance is experienced as

discomfort (Elliot & Divine, 1994), and because of this discomfort, the human tendency is to

justify one’s actions that resulted in the dissonance rather than change their beliefs in a way that

would ‘generate fruitful and testable hypotheses’. What I find interesting here is Dana’s

interpretation of the conversation as reflective. In this space, Dana’s tendencies toward open-

mindedness (she was willing to entertain Charlene’s perspectives) wholeheartedness, directness

(she seems to see the validity in her own experience) and responsibility (she seems to understand

that there are consequences to her thinking) are enacted. And yet Dana and Charlene did not

‘stay with’ the dissonance to work through the phases of reflection. They seem to have merely

justified their opinions.

It seems as though even when the (dis)positions of reflection are enacted in the space of

relation with another, reflection does not inevitably occur. Were the motives of both Dana and

Charlene to justify their actions? This alignment could explain the creation of a space that

fostered the enactment of open-mindedness, wholeheartedness, directness, and responsibility.

But remember, not only does alignment of one another’s motives seem to matter, alignment of

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those motives with the purposes of reflection also matters. It does not seem that Dana and

Charlene entered this space with the purpose of creating warranted assertabilities from this

experience. And even if they did, perhaps they lacked the background knowledge and judgment

to create the dialectic tension that seems to thrust reflective thinking.

Thinking about her experiences alone or with peers does not seem to propel Dana into

and through reflection. In the above descriptions of her experiences of reflection she does not

describe a consummatory experience that suggests something was done here (Dewey, 1934). I

asked what it was like to have conversations with me during our teaching cycles. Dana described

the experience as,

D: Ahhhhhh when I’m reflecting alone I am also planning for next time but

when I am reflecting with you I guess I am thinking about next time. When I am

reflecting alone I think a lot about literally [the] next time. Next time I see that

student. But when I am reflecting with you I think about my general teaching

perspective. And maybe it has more to do with who I am as a person when I am

reflecting with someone else. And when I am reflecting on my own I am thinking

about where I want to go next like ahhh less philosophy.

A: I was thinking that.

D: More literal when I am thinking on my own. I am more literal. What can I

do to produce results? When I am with you I am thinking this is my teaching

philosophy what can I do to support that so that my students learn and grow the most.

Although Dana is not using the vocabulary associated with reflection here, I think she is

describing an experience of going beyond problem-solving and ‘staying with’ dissonance

skillfully enough to create a “warranted assertability” (Dewey, 1938, p. 15) about teaching and

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learning in general. I view the creation of warranted assertabilities as not necessarily equivalent

to philosophy. Philosophy entails ontology, epistemology, and the relation of the two. I think as

one creates warranted assertabilities through reflecting on life’s experiences, one develops their

personal ontology and epistemology. In my particular interactions with Dana, I perceive us as

creating warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning that are general in a sense and she

experiences that as philosophy and different from problem solving. I think this difference occurs,

in part, as a result of using my judgment to discern what aspects of her experience are pertinent

to understanding teaching and learning. For example, in the video we watched together of a

reflective conversation we had during one of our teaching cycles, Dana thought she designed and

facilitated a series of lessons in which the children were reading and writing a lot. When I

presented her with the evidence that the students actually read three minutes and 48 seconds, she

experienced dissonance. Her face turned red. She felt bad.

D: These poor children all they need to know how to do is read and I am only

letting them do 3 minutes.

She began to rationalize and justify (the collaborating teacher had told her to use those

books) the fact that the students didn’t read a lot. I then created dialectic tension as I presented

related ideas. I asked her about the level of text the students were reading. Why did it seem that

the students appeared to experience little challenge? Why were they finished reading so quickly?

Dana stayed with me. She asked questions, she thought of possibilities. She described the

experience as,

D: It’s hard sure. I don't... it’s hard for me to get... OK so I get uncomfortable

all the time but I can just pretend I'm not long enough to get comfortable again. So I

like being uncomfortable. So you asking ‘are you comfortable or not.’ I'm probably

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not wicked comfortable cause I'm realizing that ‘ok I was confident but now not so

much’ so obviously I am going to be uncomfortable. But I don't think that is a bad

thing.

D: What I thought was a good lesson now I am kind of changing my mind. I

don't think the blame is on you. I think you are presenting me with ideas that is

making me change my own mind. Does that make sense?

When Dana referred to me presenting her with ideas, I believe she was speaking of the

phases of reflection. By asking questions and wholeheartedly engaging with the matter at hand,

Dana and I were working through the phases of reflection.

(1). suggestions, in which the mind leaps forward to a possible solution;


(directly experienced) into a problem to be solved, a question for which the

answer must be sought;

(3) the use of one suggestion after another as a leading idea, or hypothesis, to initiate

and guide observation and other operations in collection of factual material;

(4) the mental elaboration of the idea or supposition as an idea or supposition

(reasoning, in the sense in which reasoning is a part, not the whole, of inference);

and

(5) testing the hypothesis by overt or imaginative action. (Dewey, 1933, p.107).

Dana and I intellectualized the problem that was created when I shared my observation of

the students not engaged in a lot of reading. I presented leading ideas (what impact the level of

the text may have had on the amount of reading, how do we know their instructional levels) to

help guide our further observation of the experience in an effort to collect factual material.

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Through our conversation, we mentally elaborated on these ideas and how they were connected

with one another. We imaginatively tested our hypothesis as we discussed what a series of

lessons would be like when children are matched with instructional level text and reading a lot.

Despite evidence of working through the phases of reflection, when we viewed

this interaction together, Dana shared,

D: ...but I would have spent more time on the time thing [noting how many

minutes the children were actually reading] because I mean at the time [of the

teaching cycle] I was like oh my god I can’t believe I did that. And right now I have

the same feeling. But I don't think I did anything about it.

So despite having a reflective conversation with a knowledgeable other, which resulted in

a warranted assertability (students need to be matched with instructional level text during guided

reading in order to create a challenging environment for then to engage in a lot of reading and

writing) Dana reported that she didn’t remember doing anything with that warranted assertability

in her future overt actions.

So it appears as though even when Dana is in a space with a knowledgeable other in

which she positions herself as wholehearted, open-minded, direct, and responsible, a space in

which we proceed through the reflective process and create a “warranted assertability” about

teaching and learning it does not result in future overt action. Although Dewey (1933) notes that

the fruit of reflection can be imagined or overt future action, I see the absence of overt future

action as problematic in teacher education. If the warranted assertabilities created from reflection

do not inform the pre-service teacher’s overt actions with children then what is the benefit of the

challenging, time-consuming work of reflecting? Why bother? This is important. And brings me

to our third hermeneutic window: the role writing might play in the reflection process.

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Before I present the third hermeneutic window however, I would like to summarize my

understandings of dissonance and the roles judgment and knowledgeable others play in reflection

as it was experienced by Dana. First, it strikes me that dissonance persists throughout the

reflection process. Dewey (1933) writes that dissonance is the pre-reflective phase of reflection,

the impetus for reflective thought. It appears however, that dissonance ebbs and flows

throughout the process. Dana and I didn’t experience dissonance and then rationally,

scientifically, unemotionally examine the felt dissonance. Rather, we ‘stayed with’ dissonance

and as a result created more dissonance. As our differing ideas and interpretations of Dana’s

teaching experience collided, dissonance occurred. As we revisited the video of her experience it

seemed as though dissonance ebbed. As I asked Dana a question about the relationship of level

of text and amount of time reading dissonance flowed. As I detailed how to determine a students‘

instructional level dissonance ebbed. And so on. I even wonder, at the end of this particular

reflection cycle, if dissonance was still not present. Were there remaining ideas that needed

further exploration? Was the warranted assertability we created thoroughly understood by Dana?

As Dana recalled of this experience, she wished we had spent more time on the idea of children

reading more. I believe much more inquiry is necessary to understand the role dissonance plays

throughout the reflection process.

Additionally, it appears as though I, as knowledgable other (one who is knowledgeable

about the content being discussed and the process of reflection) was needed to help to create

dissonance by pointing out (using my judgment) aspects of Dana’s experience that she

overlooked but that were important for understanding teaching and learning. As knowledgable

other, I created dissonance with Dana as I pointed out discrepancies between what she

interpreted and what evidence the video provided. As knowledgeable other, I asked questions

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intended to propel us through the reflection process. For all of this to occur, I needed to rely on

my judgment being a member of the community of practice (Wegner, 1998) of teaching with a

deep, theoretical understanding about literacy and experience in teaching literacy to elementary

students.

Writing: A Tool for Propelling Dana Into and Through Reflection

The prior hermeneutic window created a problematic aspect of reflection. It appears as

though even when Dana was in space with a knowledgeable other in which she positioned

herself as wholehearted, open-minded, direct, and responsible, a space in which we proceeded

through the reflective process and created a “warranted assertability” about teaching and learning

it did not result in future overt action. Although Dewey (1933) notes that the fruit of reflection

can be imagined or overt future action, I see the absence of overt future action as troublesome in

teacher education. If the “warranted assertabilities” created from reflection do not inform the pre-

service teacher’s overt actions with children then what is the benefit of the challenging, time-

consuming work of reflecting? Why bother? This is important. And brings me to our third

hermeneutic window and the role writing might play in the reflection process.

Throughout our conversations, Dana made references to writing.

D: I take a lot of notes. Always. If I am not teaching I’m writing.

A: So when you are sitting there and you are in the classroom being in the

moment means what? What are you thinking about? What are you...

D: Um

A: It means for you taking notes I think you just said.

D: But do you know what is funny? I often do not look back at my notes. I

literally like take them. I think the act of taking them makes me think about them.

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The idea of taking notes while one is observing is not new. It is also not without

problems. Judgment plays a key role in what one attends to while they are observing. What one

notices, what one places emphasis on, all impacts what gets written down. For Dana, the act of

writing keeps her in the moment. But does being in the moment result in experiences of

dissonance that could lead to reflective thought?

D: ...like I have a list. And I have things I will never do and things I will do in

my teaching.

A: Like a literal list or in your mind?

D: Yes I have a list on my computer. Um things I will never do and I often

drop a note on my phone and when I get home I put them on my computer. Like

things I really believe in and things I don’t ever want to see myself do as a teacher. So

I think about those big ideas after school.

Dana uses the genre of note taking and list making to create teaching do’s and don’ts. For

Dana, writing in this genre does not seem to lead to reflective thought. Creating a ‘do and don’t

list of teaching’ in isolation could further concretize a technical rationality (Schon, 1983) view of

teaching where one views teaching as a list of do’s rather than contextually dependent and

nuanced acts.

However, maybe note-taking as a genre is not without merit as it relates to reflection. It

seems a knowledgeable other would be helpful while a pre-service teacher is taking notes while

observing. For example, when watching literacy instruction, pre-service teachers could attend to

the eight pillars of effective literacy instruction (Cunningham & Allington, 2011). The eight

pillars might help them to place emphasis on pertinent aspects of their experience. Aspects that

when engaged with during the phases of reflection could result in warranted assertabilities about

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teaching and learning. It seems this would be helpful, however, in a prior study (Gelfuso &

Dennis, 2012, in review) Danielle and I found that even when the eight pillars were used as the

lens through which to code the video of their own instruction, the pre-service teachers often

misinterpreted what the eight pillars meant or did not recognize when they were or were not

present. Dana refers to the influence the eight pillars had on the coding of her video,

D: I don’t think in watching the video the eight pillars really helped me but in

planning it did.

A: Ok

D: So when planning I was like Ok after I planned I was like Ok what kinds of

things am I missing here? Oh I see. the kids aren't reading a lot. Maybe I should have

them read something.

A: Yeah [watching video] so what then can you describe is helpful when you

are watching your video?

D: Um I think the first thing that naturally I look at is engagement. If I think

the kids are off the walls I’m not happy with the way the lesson went. And I think

about how I can change that. But I don’t usually have too much problem with

engagement. So cause I I really work hard to make sure that the lessons are engaging.

Um so after after I see that the kids are in whatever text they are looking at...

D: ...and then I try to compare like Ok at the beginning of the lesson here is

what I know about this kid. Is he making progress to where I want him to be at? Like

I look at the the objective and I think about Ok are they working towards that? Are

they just kind of just staying still. And then I go through and I when I am coding I’m

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doing what you are doing right now with the number ahh the times and I write down

if I don’t like something I write down how I would fix it

Yet, Danielle and I also found that when the eight pillars were used to guide the coding of

their video, our conversations were more about teaching and learning (as opposed to surface

management and issues with their collaborating teachers) than when the eight pillars were

absent. For Dana, the eight pillars did not seem that helpful in her coding but it was in fact our

different interpretations of two of those eight pillars that propelled us into and through reflection

on the video we watched together.

Dana also refers to reading from her notes as we are having our reflective conversations

and writing additional notes about our conversation.

D: ...you can see me reading part of what I said and that like triggered it. And

I just wanted to bring it up with you at the moment. Yeah but when I am watching

videos I like to be really harsh and write whatever I think and then kind of say it to

you. And see, you know, does she think that is a good idea....

A: Was that breath [referring to her exhaling on the video we were watching

of one of our teaching cycle conversations] just a breath or was that a sign of like...

D: That is ahhh I got it all written down cause like I often forget so if I get it

all out then I’m like ohh yes whewww I didn't forget anything.

At this point it seems that writing is a way to collect content for Dana. Writing keeps

Dana in the moment, focused, albeit using her own judgment, on what her experience is

presenting her. This may open the possibility for dissonance to be experienced. When she was

note-taking as she observed a video of her own teaching, I believe she entered the first phase of

reflection as outlined by Dewey, (1933, p. 107)

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1) suggestions, in which the mind leaps forward to a possible solution”.

Dana noticed aspects of her teaching she thought were important (engagement, student

progress) and wrote down possible solutions to ‘fix it’ that she wished to share with me. This

writing provided an artifact for her to refer to during our reflective conversations. Additionally,

as we moved through the other phases of reflection together,


(directly experienced) into a problem to be solved, a question for which the answer

must be sought;


to initiate and guide observation and other operations in collection of factual material;


supposition (reasoning, in the sense in which reasoning is a part, not the whole, of

inference); and

(5) testing the hypothesis by overt or imaginative action. (Dewey, 1933,

p.107).

Dana took notes about those ideas and imagined actions. This writing act served the

purpose of keeping her in the moment during our conversation but also provided an artifact that

could have been used to impel Dana’s overt action using the warranted assertability we created

during our dialectic interaction. This, I believe was an opportunity lost in my interactions with

Dana. The teaching cycles as they were designed ended with our reflective conversation and the

formation of a new hypothesis to be tested out in experience during a subsequent teaching cycle.

But Dana said,

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D: ...but I would have spent more time on the time thing [minutes her students

spent reading] because I don't think I mean at the time I was like oh my god I can’t

believe I did that. And right now I have the same feeling. But I don't think I did

anything about it.

She doesn’t think she did anything about it.

I wonder if using a knowledge transformation strategy (McCutchen, Teske & Bankson,

2008), would have made more salient our conversation which might lead to overt action. I

believe the writing that Dana created during the teaching cycle helped to keep her in the moment

and wholeheartedly focus on the matter at hand but it did not lead to transformative thinking.

The notes created an artifact that served as a collection of content. I wonder if those notes made

during our conversations could be used differently.

There is evidence which suggests writing strategies can consist of both knowledge telling

and/or knowledge transformation. McCutchen et al. (2008) discuss Bereiter and Scadamalia’s

use of these terms and describe knowledge telling as a strategy that involves writers probing their

memory “with a cue derived from the writing assignment’s topic or genre and retrieving relevant

knowledge for the text” (p.452). Knowledge transformation is a strategy which “initiates

interactions between content and rhetorical knowledge, with the potential for transforming both”

(p.452). But I wonder if knowledge transformation strategies can occur in different mediums

such as drama and drawing.

Perhaps note-taking and coding video are writing genres which call for knowledge telling

strategies to be employed. The writing assignment for these tasks are to use the eight pillars to

locate evidence of or absence of effective literacy instruction. As such, Dana retrieved the

relevant knowledge (that which she already knows) to create the texts (notes, codes). I did the

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same. I took notes and coded the video using my knowledge. These texts (my notes and Dana’s

notes) were used to create dialectic tension and thrust us into reflection phases. We viewed these

artifacts as our minds leapt forward to possible solutions. We negotiated meanings as we

recognized discrepancies in our notes. We talked. As such we created a new text, our

conversation. Dana used writing as a tool to remember (collect content) the ideas created in that

new text.

But we did not use a knowledge transformation strategy to engage with the texts (notes)

from our conversation. We could have. When Dana said she “would have spent more time on the

time thing”, I wonder what could have happened if Dana engaged in a knowledge transformation

strategy after our conversation. Is there something more that can be done with the notes created

from our conversations? Can transformative thinking strategies such as writing or tableaux

(Branscombe & Schneider, 2013) provide support for making more memorable the “warranted

assertabilities” formed during conversations with a knowledgeable other? Maybe knowledge

telling strategies thrust us into reflection and maybe knowledge transformation strategies create

the consummatory experience Dewey writes about? After having a conversation with a

knowledgeable other, during which they were guided through the phases of reflection and

provided opportunities to clarify content and make connections, could pre-service teachers

engage in portrayals of what is possible that may serve to inform their future overt action?

This makes me think about genres and learning new genres. For writing to be meaningful

throughout the reflection process, rather than a mere assignment to be completed, I think pre-

service teachers need to have an understanding of the purposes/audiences of the genres they are

being asked to use to make meaning from their field experiences as well as a fluency with those

genres. Dana seemed fluent in the genre of note-taking and coding. She understood the purpose

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of coding as a means by which to see problems and fix them. Coding was a way for her to run

ideas by me. To see if I thought they were ‘good’. And although I wished she understood the

purpose of coding to be practicing her judgment with the eight pillars of effective literacy

instruction, it didn't seem to matter. It seemed the important part of note-taking and coding was

that it provided texts that were juxtaposed to create dialectic tension. Her coding and my coding

coming into contact thrust us into reflection.

Conclusion

In this chapter, I engaged in dialectic writing as I juxtaposed the data created from

conversations with Dana with theoretical writings about reflection. This writing resulted in three

hermeneutic windows (Sumara, 1996) which were framed with the following titles: (1)

(Dis)positions: Tendencies Toward Temporary Places; (2) ‘Staying With’ Dissonance: The

Roles Judgment and Knowledgeable Others Play in the Phases of Reflection; and (3) Writing: A

Tool for Propelling Dana Into and Through Reflection). I believe through these windows one

can get a fresh or new glimpse of reflection. Namely, the possibility that (dis) positions occur in

relation with others and can possibly be developed, the possibility that dissonance is experienced

throughout the phases of reflection, the possibility that writing (in the genres of note-taking and

coding) can create the texts, which when juxtaposed with a knowledgeable other, can create the

dissonance needed to begin the reflective process. In the following the chapter, I discuss the

implications these possibilities might have for teacher education.

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Chapter Five

Possibilities

“The search must be ongoing; the end can never be quite known”

Maxine Greene, 1995, p.15.

Hermeneutic Phenomenology: An Ongoing Affair

I preface this chapter with the words of Maxine Greene (1995), “ He [Dewey] knew well

that there are no guarantees; he was talking, as I am attempting to do, about openings, about

possibilities, about moving in quest and in pursuit” (p.15). I believe the hermeneutic project is a

never ending affair. Insights gained, understandings formed, lead to new possibilities. This text

was produced by myself, Dana, and the countless other textual influences which have colored my

thinking, and re/presents one of many possibilities of reflection. I trust the reader and co-

constructor of meaning of this text will further imbue meaning to the processes of reflection

described and interpreted here.

The value of this research is the extent to which it has achieved referential adequacy

(Eisner, 2003). If the reader has experienced the construct of reflection in a new and fresh way

then this adequacy has been achieved. Additionally, the implications of this research are guided

by the belief that, “ generalization is possible because...the general resides in the particular and

because what one learns from a particular one applies to other situations one subsequently

encounters” (Eisner, 2003, p. 7). Therefore, reflection, as it was understood through the process

of this particular study can be informative in a general sense to both my future practice and to

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other teacher educators who work with pre-service teachers. Below, I discuss possibilities for

reflection in teacher education.

What is Reflection?

Reflection has been a mainstay in teacher education since the publication of Schon’s

(1983) book, The Reflective Practitioner. Reflection has been lauded as the means by which pre-

service teachers become problem-solvers and meet the intellectual challenges of the classroom

(Quinn, Pultorak, Young, and McCarthy, 2010). However, reflection remains an “ambiguous and

contentious construct” (Collin, Karsenti, and Komis, 2012, p. 104). It seems as though teacher

educators view reflection as a way pre-service teachers create meaning from their field

experiences either in isolation (Chamoso & Caceres, 2008; Hamlin, 2004; Rodman, 2010) or in

relation with others (Anderson & Matkins, 2011; Khourey-Bowers, 2005). However, I believe

the spirit behind the phrase ‘create meaning’ can lead to a relativism that is not present in

Dewey’s writings (1933, 1938) about the reflective mode of thought. In other words, when asked

to write about a field experience, a pre-service teacher can create any meaning rather than a

warranted assertability. For example, in the Children’s Literature class I am currently teaching, a

pre-service teacher who experienced a group of second graders ‘building stamina’ by all reading

from the same text during independent reading time for 20 minutes, shared with me that that was

a ‘good’ practice because the students were ‘reading’. Her thinking about this experience left her

with the assertability that children develop stamina by requiring them to read for 20 minutes in

an assigned text. I argue this assertability is not warranted. Dewey (1933) writes,



warrant; that is as ground of belief. (p.11)

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For this pre-service teacher the evidence for this statement was her seeing children

‘reading’ for 20 min. When I engaged in a conversation with her, I asked ‘How do you know the

children were reading’? Due to her novice understandings about literacy and independent

reading, she confused looking at a book and turning pages with ‘reading’. However, when

looking at this experience “through something else which stands witness” (Dewey, 1933, p.11),

such as theories about independent reading levels, student choice and its relation to motivation,

and purposes of reading, it is highly unlikely that these students were building ‘stamina’ by

‘reading’ text that most likely was not a good match for their independent reading levels, their

interests, or their purposes for reading. Therefore, her assertability, her belief, that children

develop ‘stamina’ by requiring them to read for 20 minutes in an assigned text is unwarranted.

But she does not know her idea is unwarranted. I believe she experiences this assertability as

true. It would seem true to her because of her limited judgment. I asked her to take turns sitting

down with three or four of the children next time they were building ‘stamina’ and ask them to

share with her what they were reading and to read a little bit of the text aloud to her. My

intention of asking her this was to possibly provide her with an experience that most likely will

create evidence that some of the students are not understanding what they are reading, some of

the students may not be able to decode many of the words in the text, and/or some students being

bored with a text that is not challenging or interesting for them. Then, with this experience, I may

be able to create dissonance with her as I ask her if all of the students were actually reading.

The above example is to make the point that one can think about a field experience in

isolation but in order to reflect on a field experience in an attempt to create “warranted

assertabilities” (Dewey, 1938, p.15) about teaching and learning, one needs to engage in the

communal activity of interacting with knowledgeable others, be it theories about teaching and

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learning and/or people within the community of practice (Wenger, 1998) of teaching. Is the

purpose of reflection to create unwarranted assertabilities, opinions, beliefs? I wonder if many

teacher educators have confused reflection with thinking. Reflection is different from thinking.

Dewey (1933) makes an important distinction between thinking and reflecting. Although

they are often used interchangeably, there are significant differences between the two. Thinking

is aligned with thoughts and feelings, impulses. Dewey (1933) writes,

Hence it is that he [sic] who offers ‘a penny for your thoughts’ does not expect to drive

any great bargain if his offer is taken; he will only find out what happens to be ‘going through

the mind’ and what ‘goes’ in this fashion rarely leaves much that is worthwhile behind. (p.4)

Thinking is comprised of the myriad of images and “uncontrolled coursing of ideas”

(Dewey, 1933, p.4) that populate our minds. Reflection is different. Reflection is the

Active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of

knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further conclusions to

which it tends (Dewey, 1933, p.9)

Pre-service teachers can think about their field experiences and create their own meaning

from those experiences but I do not believe that this results in “warranted assertabilities”

(Dewey, 1938, p.15) about teaching and learning?

In this study, I have made the shift from reflection as ‘creating meaning’ to reflection as

creating warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning. When this shift is made, it is no

longer adventitious to level the products of reflection. There are no levels. One either reflects,

going through the phases of reflection


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factual material;




(5) testing the hypothesis by overt or imaginative action. (Dewey, 1933,

p.107).

and creating a warranted assertability, or one does not. The question for me is ‘Does a pre-

service teacher now understand something about teaching and learning, that is warranted, as a

result of engaging in reflection?’ She/he may have an idea or thought about teaching and

learning but is it warranted, supported by both theory and experiential data?

This is a subtle but important shift. Our pre-service teachers must develop understandings

about teaching and learning that are warranted. If field experiences, which pre-service teachers

are now engaged in more of (Zeichner, 2010) are to be useful in preparing future teachers who

can positively impact student learning, then what meaning is made from those experiences is

critical. Not just any meaning. Rather, warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning.

I believe the idea ‘warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning’ needs to be

considered carefully by teacher educators. One might be tempted to think that a list of warranted

assertabilities could be made about teaching and learning and then it is those assertabilities that

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pre-service teachers would need to know. I do not think this is the case. I think it is the process of

reflection that is experienced by the pre-service teacher and knowledgeable other that creates

warranted assertabilities for an individual. In other words, I can not simply tell a pre-service

teacher a warranted assertability about teaching and learning. Or rather I could tell her/him a

warranted assertability but it would not be her/his warranted assertability because the pre-service

did not engage with her/his experience to co-create understanding. It would be my warranted

assertability that I have created by the dialectic tension of theory and experience in my teaching

practice. The pre-service teacher could choose to believe or not believe what I say as they wish.

She/he could believe or not believe but she/he would not understand. I do not mean the phrases

‘my warranted assertability’ and ‘her/his warranted assertability’ to be taken as relativistic.

Rather, I think a person needs to engage with her/his experience and reflection with a

knowledgeable other to create a warranted assertability that is understood by her/him. And so

understood will be used by the person to make context specific decisions about teaching and

learning in the future. In my mind, it is possible that many people through engaging in reflection

with a knowledgeable other would come to many of the same warranted assertabilities about

teaching and learning. However, this is different than telling a pre-service teacher a warranted

assertability. It is through her/his own experience of dissonance and reflection, through the time

and effort of reflecting, that she/he understands. I think it is the understanding that is the

assertability. It is the belief. It is warranted because the formation of the assertability has been

guided by a knowledgeable other who used her/his judgment to provide the “something else

which stands as witness, evidence, proof, voucher, warrant; that is as ground of belief (Dewey,

1933, p.11).

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If the creation of warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning as I described

above is desirable, then teacher educators need to reengage with the idea of reflection and

consider the conditions necessary for reflection to occur. If the sought after outcome of more

time in the field is the preparation of future teachers who understand teaching and learning and

therefore can be responsive to the needs of their future students, then I believe teacher educators

would need to provide the conditions for reflection to take place.

Conditions for Reflection

If the purpose of reflection is to create meaning from an experience then all that is needed

is an experience and a mode (i.e. writing, blogging, conversation) of getting down one’s

thoughts. However, when reflection is viewed as the process which results in the creation of

warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning, then the conditions for reflection need to be

carefully considered. In order for a warranted assertability to be created from reflecting about an

experience, judgment needs to be exercised about on what in the experience emphasis ought to

be placed. Therefore, it seems as though the experience on which one is reflecting needs to be

captured in a way that can be referred to throughout the reflection process.

Capturing Experience

In this study, video was an important condition in place for reflection to occur. Both the

pre-service teacher and the knowledgeable other can exercise her/his judgment by coding

moments of an experience [video recorded]. These moments are selected because each

participant deems them to be important clues which might support or refute a given hypothesis

about teaching and learning.

The use of video is different from the common practice of a university supervisor

observing a pre-service teacher in real time. In the observation model, the university supervisor

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typically takes notes about the teaching and learning she/he observed in one lesson. The

university supervisor and pre-service teacher then engage in a conversation about the lesson. It

has been my experience, that under these conditions, the pre-service teacher is primarily

concerned with whether the lesson was ‘good’ and if she/he did a ‘good’ job. Additionally, the

university supervisor seems content if the pre-service teacher can identify what she/he believes

went well in the lesson, what did not go so well, and what she/he might do differently in the

future. Occasionally the university supervisor will then offer an opinion about how to ‘make it

better.’ This interaction and the focus on ‘making it better’ is often referred to as reflecting. Yet

it is unlikely that a warranted assertability, or an understanding about teaching and learning that

has grounds for belief is created from this type of interaction for several reasons.

First, the pre-service teacher is relying on her/his memory of an experience which just

occurred. Because the experience was not captured in a way that could be visually, aurally, and

mutually revisited, the pre-service teacher is unable to examine the experience in an effort to

collect factual data which may serve to support or refute an hypothesis about teaching and

learning. Secondly, although the university supervisor typically takes notes while observing,

she/he may have missed important subtleties within the interactions between the pre-service

teacher and the K-12 students within the lesson which may also provide experiential evidence

that supports or refutes an hypothesis. Additionally, the pre-service teacher and the university

supervisor have nothing to which they can refer if/when they have differing views about a given

aspect of the experience. For these reasons, capturing the experience upon which the pre-service

teacher and university supervisor are reflecting seems to be an important condition for judgment

to be exercised and the collection of factual evidence to occur. And, yet, to further challenge this

notion, I do not believe one can capture experience per se. There will always be more to an

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experience than can be captured by video but the traces of the experience can be more carefully

examined when video is present.

Experience captured seems to be important to the reflection process. Therefore, I believe

it is critical for teacher educators to attend to how the experience upon which they are reflecting

is captured in an manner that allows it to be referred to throughout the reflection process.

Gathering Evidence/Juxtaposing Ideas/Creating Dissonance

In addition to capturing experience, another consideration must be the act of analyzing

the experience. In my study, the genres of note-taking and coding were a means to create the

texts that were juxtaposed during the reflection conversations. It seems as though it is necessary

for both people to enter the reflective conversation space with initial ideas and evidence (in my

case, from the video) because it is the juxtaposition of the different ideas which creates

dissonance and spawns reflection. Coding, note-taking and writing are genres which seem to be

conduits for gathering evidence, juxtaposing ideas, and creating dissonance. For example, when

the pre-service teacher and university supervisor sit down to reflect on a field experience, they

have gathered, using their respective judgment, evidence (in the form of coding) from the

experience which supports or refutes an hypothesis about teaching and learning. The pre-service

teacher shares her/his evidence by referring to her/his notes and explaining how she/he thinks the

evidence is related to the hypothesis. The university supervisor listens. It is important that as the

supervisor is listening she/he is exercising her/his judgment to determine if the evidence the pre-

service teacher has deemed relevant is indeed related to the hypothesis. At the same time, the

supervisor is looking at, reading her/his notes to see if she/he gathered evidence which could be

juxtaposed with a piece of evidence the pre-service teacher cited in an attempt to create

dissonance.

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To further elaborate I will use the example of a reflection conversation which could have

occurred between a former student of mine and myself during a teaching cycle. I write could

have occurred because at the time of this teaching cycle I had not yet developed my current

understandings about reflection, juxtaposition, and dialectic tension. However, given my current

understandings, I imagine the following possibility. In this cycle, Jenny was testing the

hypothesis ‘If I facilitate a literate conversation then kindergarteners will be able to understand

beyond the literal level of the text.’ When she came to our conversation she referred to her

coding notes and cited the evidence that the students were ‘antsy’ and that one student was

shouting out answers as moments that refuted her hypothesis. As she was citing her evidence, I

was reading my evidence and looking for a piece that could be used to juxtapose with her

evidence. I found, in my notes, evidence that the students who were ‘antsy’ were asking

thoughtful questions about the text and the student who was calling out answers was

demonstrating thinking beyond the literal meaning of the text. In reality, I believe at this point I

shared my evidence with her and stated my warranted assertability that kindergarteners are

capable of considering the deeper meaning in text when they are engaged in a literate

conversation. I did not present Jenny an opportunity to reflect, by using my coding to pose a

question that would create dissonance.

But I wonder if our conversation could have continued like this: I then posed a question

to Jenny ‘What was the kid saying who was calling out?’. To which she responded that she did

not remember. We revisited the video tape to listen. I asked, ‘Given what he just said, what does

that say about his understanding of the text?’ To which she responded ‘I guess that he really did

understand a lot’. At this point in the conversation, two pieces of evidence (the student shouting

out with what the student is saying) are juxtaposed. And yet I do not believe Jenny is

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experiencing dissonance yet. So I ask, ‘What does that make you think about student behavior

and learning? In other words, does ‘antsy’ behavior and calling out mean learning isn’t

happening?’. ‘I guess not’ Jenny said. ‘So when you are teaching, what do you think is important

to pay attention to in order to determine if students are learning?’ I asked. ‘What they are

saying?‘ she asks. ‘Yes, I think so. Based on what these children were saying, do you think we

have evidence which suggests kindergarteners can think beyond the literal meaning of text when

they are engaged in a literate conversation?’ I asked. Jenny replied ‘I guess so, I guess I didn’t

see it like that’. ‘OK so based on our evidence from the video and our conversation today, what

do you understand about teaching and learning. What will you take away from this time

together?’ I asked. Jenny responded, ‘As a teacher I need to pay close attention to what the

students are saying and not be completely distracted by what their bodies are doing if I want to

see if they are learning. And I guess kindergarteners can understand the text beyond a literal

level if they are engaged in a literate conversation.’ ‘Those are important things to understand.

Why don’t you write them down.’

The above example appears glossy and squeaky clean to me. The questions seem to have

created dissonance and Jenny seemed to be able to stay with the dissonance and create two

warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning. However, I know from my practice, that

this conversation would most likely not be so neat and clean. There would be many twists and

turns in the conversation. And yet, I wonder, if, with further study and refinement of my practice,

I will be able to facilitate reflection that resembles the above imagined interaction.

Indeed, I believe far more study within the field of teacher education is needed to

understand how one goes about creating dissonance and dialectic tension in relation with pre-

service teachers. By interpreting actual transcripts of conversations during which reflection did

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occur, I wonder if patterns of interactions could be noticed that seem to create dissonance and

dialectic tension. In other words, I wonder if pedagogies of facilitating reflection could be

created and understood through the careful examination of reflective conversations. If so, I think

being able to name and describe pedagogies which seem to impel reflection all the way through

to the formation of warranted assertabilities would be greatly beneficial to teacher educators.

The third hermeneutic window (Writing: A Tool for Propelling Dana Into and Through

Reflection) also presented the possibility that knowledge transformation strategies (writing,

tableaux, drawing, etc.) may be helpful in making more memorable the warranted assertabilities

that are created as a result of reflecting with a knowledgeable other. In the above example of

Jenny’s teaching cycle, I wonder if a knowledge transformation strategy could make more

memorable the two warranted assertabilities she created by reflecting:

As a teacher I need to pay close attention to what the students are saying and not be

completely distracted by what their bodies are doing if I want to see if they are learning. And I

guess kindergarteners can understand the text beyond a literal level if they are engaged in a

literate conversation.

I wonder what could happen if she was asked to create a short skit with her peers which

demonstrated one of these warranted assertabilities. Would the act of determining how to portray

a group of students who were ‘antsy’ and calling out but at the same time demonstrating an

understanding of the text make more memorable her warranted assertability? Would the process

of ‘acting it out’ make more concrete her warranted assertability? Would these arts-based

experiences transform her prior knowledge that students are not learning if they are ‘antsy?‘

I believe the thinking strategy ‘knowledge transformation’ is likely to be unfamiliar to

many pre-service teachers. Therefore, this needs further exploration. How can pre-service

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teachers engage with the warranted assertabilities we create during our reflective conversations?

What types of prompts and or experiences might help them to do this? Who is the audience for

such thinking, in other words what happens to the artifacts created from engaging with the texts

(notes of the warranted assertabilities) made from reflective conversations with knowledgeable

others? All of these questions seem worthy of inquiry.

Staying With Dissonance

In addition to having the experience captured in a way that can be referred to throughout

the reflection process and using writing to create texts to be juxtaposed during the reflective

process, it seems that both the pre-service teacher and the university supervisor need to have

aligned understandings about the purposes of reflection. A reflective conversation is a genre

with which many pre-service teachers and/or university supervisors are unfamiliar. Therefore, I

think it is important to make explicit the purposes and audiences of this genre. The purpose of a

reflective conversation is to develop understandings from experience about teaching and

learning. It is to ‘stay with’ dissonance to create warranted assertabilities about teaching and

learning. It is characterized by challenge and a certain level of discomfort. It is a space where

wholeheartedness, openness, responsibility, and directness can find temporary places to be. It is a

genre that needs intellectual stamina to enact. Dana recommended sharing some video segments

of our reflective conversations with my future students. She thought others seeing her physical

reaction to experiencing dissonance and then seeing how she ‘stayed with’ the dissonance would

be helpful for them as they begin to practice this genre. I agree.

The Role of the Knowledgeable Other: Implications for Teacher Educators

Reflection as envisioned by Dewey is communal (Campbell, DaWaal, Hart, et al. 2008,

p. 192) ). And it is in the interaction with others that knowledge can be created. However,

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reflection neither occurs with just any other, nor just within any interaction. I believe the two

hermeneutic windows (1) (Dis)positions: Tendencies Toward Temporary Places and (2) ‘Staying

With’ Dissonance: The Roles Judgment and Knowledgeable Others Play in the Phases of

Reflection, provide a view of the knowledgeable other and the interactions which occur

throughout the reflection process.

The first window framed (dis)positions differently. Although Dewey (1933) and Rodgers

(2001) point to the primacy of dispositions (openness, wholeheartedness, directness, and

responsibility) in relation to a person’s ability to enact reflection, I view them now as tendencies

toward temporary places. The relational view of (dis)positions I created presents possibilities for

teacher educators to create spaces and moments in which pre-service teachers can enact these

(dis)positions that may, over time develop into tendencies.

If this is a warranted assertability, then the teacher educator must know how to create

spaces and moments for pre-service teachers to enact the dispositions of openness,

wholeheartedness, directness, and responsibility. Given that pre-service teachers and teacher

educators come from a myriad of backgrounds with varying degrees of experiences with these

(dis)positions, the work would be highly contextualized and nuanced, much like teaching. So

then, how can teacher educators learn about cultivating the above (dis)positions? Could

reflecting with a knowledgeable other create warranted assertabilities about facilitating

reflection? Could a teacher educator video her/his interactions with pre-service teachers as they

are facilitating the reflection process and code for experiential evidence that supports or refutes

an hypothesis about cultivating (dis)positions? Could a teacher educator then engage in a

conversation with a knowledgeable other (one who already has developed warranted

assertabilities about facilitating reflection) in order to create dialectic tension which would spawn

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reflection? Could the teacher educator develop warranted assertabilities about facilitating

reflection by engaging in supported reflection?

Does the above described teaching cycle occur in teacher education institutions? How

often and how skillfully do teacher educators reflect, with knowledgeable others, on their own

practice in an effort to create warranted assertabilities about facilitating pre-service teacher

reflection? Given recent calls for increased field experiences (NCATE, 2010), I think it is

imperative that teacher educators develop their own pedagogies for facilitating reflection. I

believe these pedagogies can be developed from reflecting on their own practice with a

knowledgeable other and creating warranted assertabilities about the teaching and learning of

pre-service teachers.

The second hermeneutic window shows dissonance to be present throughout the

reflection process. It appears to be created by the juxtaposition of the pre-service teacher’s

interpretations of her/his experience and the knowledgeable other’s interpretations. In this way,

dissonance is not left to happen by chance but rather is created in relation with a knowledgeable

other who uses her/his content knowledge and knowledge about reflection to create dialectic

tension with a pre-service teacher. Staying with the dissonance created seems to play an

important role in the reflection process.

Staying with dissonance throughout the reflection process requires facile and deep

content knowledge. For example, when preparing for a reflection conversation with a pre-service

teacher, the knowledgeable other has time to visit the video of the teaching and craft questions

designed to maintain dissonance and push the pre-service teacher through the phases of

reflection. However, during the actual interaction, the pre-service teacher may present, through

her/his own coding and judgment of the experience, significant misunderstandings. A

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knowledgeable other must be able to immediately draw from her/his content knowledge to pose a

question, provide an anecdote which may maintain dissonance and propel reflection. This is not

easy. I believe it is a necessity for the knowledgeable other to have facile and deep content

(literacy, math, social studies, science, etc.) knowledge if they are to successfully guide the

reflection process to the end of creating a warranted assertability.

Therefore, I believe it is important that the teacher educator who is responsible for

‘supervising’ field experiences be a person who has deep and facile content knowledge. This

idea runs counter to how many teacher education programs view supervision. The role of

university supervisor is often given to graduate assistants who may or may not have deep and

facile knowledge of content. Moreover, supervision is often operationalized in general terms. For

example, a university supervisor is responsible for all of the pre-service teacher’s field

experiences. Typically, the university supervisor is expected to be able to observe any lesson

(literacy, math, science, etc.) and be able to facilitate the reflection of the experience. I do not

believe any one person has the content knowledge in all of these areas to skillfully interact

throughout the reflection process. Could supervision be re-imagined as content specific? Could a

teacher educator who is a content expert be responsible for the supervision of field experiences

that relate to that content? For example, a pre-service teacher would interact with a Literacy

Content Coach as she/he reflects on a literacy experience, a Math Content Coach as she/he

reflects on a math experience, etc.

However, as demonstrated above, it is not enough to have content knowledge, the

knowledgeable other must also have developed pedagogies of facilitating reflection. I believe

engaging in reflection with knowledgeable others themselves could help develop these

pedagogies. All of this takes time. Time and money. It is unreasonable to think that a university

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supervisor can prepare for and skillfully facilitate one on one reflection with large numbers of

pre-service teachers. Therefore, consideration must be giving to teaching loads and assignments

which ultimately impact budgets and personnel decisions. I know this is a common refrain: ‘It all

comes down to money’. But I believe it rings true in teacher education. There can be calls for

improved teacher education and increased quantity and quality of field experiences but in my

opinion, those calls are hollow and aimless without serious consideration of increased funding

and budgets. Yet, I believe all is not hopeless. I believe individual teacher educators in specific

contexts can have a positive impact on the education of a relatively small number of pre-service

teachers. If money is not available, then I need to consider how facilitating reflection could be

enacted within the current institutional structures.

In my own practice, I have found it challenging but possible to engage in three teaching

cycles a semester with six to seven pre-service teachers while teaching one content course. I am

currently attempting to engage in one teaching cycle this semester with each of 32 students as I

am teaching one content course. Engaging in this teaching cycle is proving to be quite difficult. I

have scheduled 32 pre-conferences each lasting 45 minutes to provide support as each pre-

service teacher plans a literate conversation lesson they will facilitate with K-12 students. This

will take 24 total hours. I am anticipating technical issues as 32 pre-service teachers attempt to

upload the video of their teaching to my external hard drive in the time frame of two weeks. I

will then view each video (likely 16 hours worth) and code them. I will then need to schedule 32

post-conferences (24 hours total) in order to engage in reflection with each pre-service teacher.

These hours and this effort will not be monetarily reimbursed. And I am unsure about my ability

to facilitate reflection and cultivate (dis)positions with 32 pre-service teachers who I do not know

that well. I will see. I am keeping a journal throughout this process and I will write more

135

thoroughly about the possibilities and limitations of facilitating reflection under current

institutional structures.

And so I wonder, is it possible for each teacher educator who is teaching a content course

to pre-service teachers to engage in one teaching cycle per semester? The pre-service teachers

would then engage in three to four content specific teaching cycles per semester. Could teacher

education institutions include, as part of teacher educator work loads, reflective teaching cycles

in which teacher educators examine their own practice in facilitating reflection with a

knowledgable other? Could the expertise of graduate assistants be more carefully matched with

teaching assignments and ‘supervision’ roles? I believe all of the above questions warrant

considerable thought if teacher education institutions are going to attempt to answer the call of

increased quantity and quality of field experiences.

It is obvious here that I am focusing on the university supervisor as knowledgeable other

in the reflection process. Absent from my writing so far is mention of the classroom teacher who

could conceivably serve as a knowledgeable other to the pre-service teacher. This absence is

intentional. It is beyond the scope of this dissertation to carefully write about some of the

challenges which I have experienced while working in elementary schools both as a Reading

Coach and university supervisor. However, I will mention briefly that significant challenges and

possibilities exist. For example, I believe there is a reason for the calls of reform in K-12

education. Based on my considerable experiences observing in-service teachers in many different

contexts and talking with in-service teachers about literacy instruction, I believe there is limited

understanding about teaching and learning within the current teaching workforce. The prior

sentence is difficult to write. I wish this was not the case but I believe it is. Perhaps, many of the

current inservice teachers I have worked with are not at fault for their limited understandings

136

about teaching and learning. Perhaps their teacher education experiences did not provide them

opportunities to reflect and create warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning. Perhaps

the current high-stakes testing and accountability environment has limited their ability to learn

from their teaching experiences by reflecting with a knowledgeable other. Whatever the reasons,

it becomes problematic when pre-service teachers are spending considerable amounts of time

watching and listening to in-service teachers who may have limited content knowledge. It

becomes problematic to ask in-service teachers to be the knowledgeable others to pre-service

teachers and facilitate the reflection process. It seems problematic and unfair to both the in-

service teacher and the pre-service teacher. To me, the above line of thinking moves directly

toward the field of professional development with in-service teachers. And this is beyond the

scope of this dissertation. But one can imagine that the Teaching Cycles described in this

dissertation could present a possibility for in-service teachers to reflect on their own practice and

create warranted assertabilities about teaching and learning. And in so doing become

knowledgeable about literacy content over time. Until then, however, I believe it is critical that

current pre-service teachers are afforded the conditions which seem necessary for reflection to

occur, one of which is being in relation with a knowledgeable other who has both deep and facile

content knowledge and warranted pedagogies for facilitating reflection.

Fusion of Horizons: A Heuristic for Facilitating Reflection

Within this dissertation is a double hermeneutic. What makes hermeneutic

phenomenology an organic fit for an inquiry into the phenomenon of reflection is that it itself is a

reflective methodology. My engagement with this phenomenon, my reflective work on bringing

to the fore my presuppositions, my staying with the tension created in the hermeneutic circle, my

fusion of horizons, all mirror in a way reflection for pre-service teachers. The pre-service

137

teachers with whom I work are asked to engage with the phenomenon of teaching and learning.

They are asked to do reflective work to bring to the fore their presuppositions about teaching and

learning. They are asked to ‘stay with’ the tension created in the hermeneutic circle. They are

asked to play with parts (individual teaching moments) and whole (teaching and learning) to

create new understandings about the phenomenon of teaching and learning. And so, it seems a

double hermeneutic was created. Two phenomena, reflection and teaching and learning,

intricately related to one another came into contact with each other through the methodology of

hermeneutic phenomenology.

A phenomenon as ubiquitous as reflection is in teacher education, needed to be engaged

with a methodology that “sets free what is hidden from view by layers of tradition, prejudice, and

even conscious evasion (Slattery, Krasny, & O’Malley, 2007). I believe my hermeneutic

engagement with Dana’s experience of reflection has resulted in new understandings about

reflection. I understand the possibilities/limitations that being in relation with a knowledgeable

other has on creating spaces for (dis)positions conducive to reflection to be enacted. I understand

differently, the possibilities/limitations of writing as a tool to propel one into reflection, to keep

one engaged through reflection, and to make more memorable the warranted assertabilities after

reflection.

These insights have caused me to think about reflection differently. As such, I think it is

useful for a new metaphor for reflection in teacher education. Maybe reflecting on field

experiences can be seen as a fusion of horizons. Fusion of horizons is a phrase used to describe

the occurrence of understanding that expands one’s current presuppositions of a phenomenon.

Gadamer (1997, p. 302) writes,

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to have an horizon” means not being limited to what is nearby, but to being

able to see beyond it...[W]orking out of the hermeneutical situation means the

achievement of the right horizon of inquiry for the questions evoked by the

encounter with tradition.

The concept, ‘fusion of horizons’ acknowledges each person’s (pre-service teacher,

university supervisor) individual horizon at the beginning of their relationship. It makes less

problematic the idea of apprenticeship of observation (Lortie, 1975). Both people at the

beginning of the inquiry (reflection on field experiences) set their horizons. They discuss what it

means to be not limited to what is nearby but rather to be imaginative and set one’s goals as

creating possibilities. The setting of horizons could open the possibility for understanding

teaching and learning anew. It could certainly attend to the findings I presented in the first

hermeneutic window (aligning motives with the purposes of reflection). Through conversation

around common texts (video of field experiences, notes, coding of video) dialectic tension could

be created by the juxtaposition of each person’s judgment. That tension could possibly result in a

fusion of horizons. An experience in which both people’s understandings about teaching and

learning have been expanded. Those understandings could be explored through knowledge

transformation strategies so that the result of reflection, of a fusion of horizons, really does

impact future overt actions.

I believe the metaphor of fusion of horizons presents a possibility for breaking the bounds

of tradition which seems to keep teaching and learning in the category of technical rationality.

This metaphor allows us to use tradition as well as imagination to set our horizons, to create

dialectic tension, to expand our understandings about teaching and learning and so to teach and

learn differently.

139

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Appendix A

Levels of Reflection

Van Manen (1977) Deliberative Rationality technical- “technical application of

educational knowledge” p.226

practical-“analyzing and clarifying individual and cultural

experiences” p. 226.

critical- “worth of knowledge and to the nature of the social

conditions necessary for raising the question of

worthwhileness” p. 227

Kitchner & King (1981) Stage 1:“beliefs simply exist; they are not derived and need

not be explained” p.93

Stage 2: “beliefs either exist or are based on the absolute

knowledge of a legitimate authority” p.93

Stage 3: “beliefs either exist or are based on an

accumulation of evidence that leads to absolute knowledge”

p.95

Stage 4: “beliefs are justified with idiosyncratic knowledge

claims” p.96

Stage 5: “beliefs are justified with appropriate decision rules

for a particular perspective or context” p.97

Stage 6: “beliefs are justified for a particular issue by using

generalized rules of evidence and inquiry” p.98

Stage 7: “beliefs reflect solutions that can be justified as

most reasonable using generalized rules of inquiry and

evaluation” p. 100.

150

Appendix A (continued)

Zeichner & Liston (1987) Factual Discourse

· descriptive

· informational

· hermeneutic

· explanatory/Hypothetical

Prudential Discourse

· instruction

· advice/opinion

· evaluation

· support

Justificatory Discourse

· pragmatic

· intrinsic

· extrinsic

Critical Discourse

· pragmatic

· intrinsic

· extrinsic

· hidden curriculum

Sparks-Langer, Simmons, Pasch,

Colton & Starko (1990)

· No descriptive language

· Simple, layperson description

· Events labeled with appropriate terms

· Explanation with tradition or personal

preference given as rationale

· Explanation with principle of theory given as

rationale

· Explanation with principle. theory and

consideration of context factors

· Explanation with consideration of ethical,

moral, political issues

Ellwein, Graue & Comfort (1990) Self-referencing

Ego-enhancing

Self-effacing

151


Mezirow (1991) Content Reflection

· reflection on what we perceive, think, feel or

act upon (p.107)

Process Reflection

· examination of how one performs the

functions of perceiving, thinking, feeling, acting and an

assessment of the efficacy of them (p.107-108)

Premise Reflection

· becoming aware of why we perceive, think,

feel or act as we do (p.108)

Hatton & Smith (1995) Descriptive writing

Descriptive reflection

Dialogic reflection

Critical reflection

Bain (1999) Reporting

Responding

Relating

Reasoning

Reconstructing

Kember (1999) Non-reflective –Habitual Action

Non-reflective-Introspection/ thoughtful action

Reflective-Content/process

Reflective- Premise

Bean & Stevens (2002) Categories Found

· Text References

· Personal Beliefs

· Individual Pedagogical Decisions

Basile, Olson, Flo & Nathenson-

MejLa (2003)

Micro-reflection

Self-reflection

Macro-reflection

152


Ward & McCotter (2004) Routine

Technical

Dialogic

Critical

Ottesen (2007) Reflection as Induction

· the ‘how’s of teaching

Reflection as Concept Development

Reflection as Imagined Practice

Husu, Toom & Patrikainen, (2008) Habituation

Introspection

Association

Integration

Validation

Appropriation

Transformation

Larrivee (2008) Pre-Reflection

Surface Reflection

Pedagogical Reflection

Critical Reflection

Lundeberg, Cooper, Fritzen &

Terpestra (2008)

Focus on Self-Management

Focus on Self- Instruction

Focus on Children-Management

Focus on Children-Instruction

Student Achievement

Teacher Move-Listening

Teacher Move-Probing

Nagle (2009) Factual

Procedural

Justificatory

Critical

153

Appendix B

Summary of Empirical Studies

Reflection as Non-Communal Activity

Writing as Medium of Reflection Memory or Video Stimulated

Dialogic Interaction as Medium of Reflection

Memory or Video Stimulated

Without Support

free topic

journal entries

With Support

prompts guiding

questions video

Asynchronous Environments (blogs, bulletin boards, email)

Synchronous Environments

Writing as

medium of for

dialogue with

peers

Writing as medium of dialogue

with peers and

instructors

Conversation with

peers/university

supervisors as medium of

reflection

154

Appendix B (continued)

Methodology/

Participants

Medium

of Text

Medium of

Reflection

Findings Thoughts/questions

Anderson &

Matkin, 2011

10 PST’s

descriptive

statistics

provided

scaffolding

prompts to

write to

different

questions for

whether they

were teaching

or they were

observing

leveled

reflection using

Kember’s 4

levels

observing

classroom

teacher

and

memory of

own

teaching

experience

required

weekly

blogs

required to

respond to a

least one

entry of a

peer

39% non

reflection

61%

reflection or

critical

reflection

3.7% critical

reflection

entires about

own teaching

were higher

than those

about

observing the

classroom

teacher

low level of

interactivity

averaging

less than one

comment per

week

According to Dewey’s

writing a person would

think more deeply about

their own experience.

How did these pre-service

teachers select the parts of

their experience they wrote

about? Did they have the

judgment to discern

pertinent aspects of their

experience?

How can pre-service

teachers create dialectic

tension when responding to

eachothers entires?

155

AAppendix B (continued)

Methodology/

Participants

Medium

of Text

Medium of

Reflection


Canandra,

Brantley-Dias, &

Fox, 2009

Modified Case

study

deductive

analysis

video of

field

experience

critical

incident

paper

Video editing

enhances

reflection

when

compared with

non-video

editing

How did the pre-service

teachers judge the important

aspects to focus on in their

video?

Chamoso &

Ca’ceres, 2009

33 Pst’s variety:

field

experience

coursewor

k

Portfolio 62% of the

PST’s wrote

only

descriptions

50% of the

time

the activity

that inspired

the greatest

amount of

reflection

were those in

which the

PST felt

personally

involved

The finding that PST’s

experience inspired the

greatest amount of

reflection is aligned with

Dewey’s writing about

experience.

156


Methodology/

Participants

Medium of

Text

Medium of

Reflection


Chitpin, 2006 memory of

field

experiences

required

journal

entries

when pre-

service

teachers are

taught the

Popperian

method of

reflection

they produce

journal

entries which

demonstrate

a high level

of reflection

What role did judgment play

here?

Chitpin, Simon,

& Galipeau,

2008

24 PSTs

testing to see

how PST’s use

the objective

knowledge

framework for

reflection

memory of

field

experience

written

description

of the

objective

knowledge

framework

cycles

24/27 PST’s

focused of

management

issues

use quick

strategies

rather than

theories to

guide their

problem

solving

Does a focus on a particular

topic (management)

preclude reflection?

Could one create a

warranted assertability

about management from

experience and reflective

thought?

157


Methodology/

Participants

Medium of

Text

Medium of

Reflection


Cohen-Sayag &

Fischl, 2012

qualitative

content

analysis and a

priori levels:

descriptive,

comparative,

critical

quantitative

ANOVA

24 special

education pre-

service

teachers

memory of

field

experience

required

structured

monthly

reflection

journal

entries

some

feedback

from

supervisor

but not a

dialogue

mostly low

level

(descriptive)

reflection

focus on

classroom

management

levels of

reflection

improved

over the year

even when

levels of

reflection

improved

their teaching

quality did

not improve

except in

cases where

the critical

level was

achieved

What about judgment?

Is it ‘good enough’ that their

teaching did not improve?

Must we then strive for

critical reflection or as I

think walking away with a

warranted assertability?

158


Dawson, 2006 PSTs

over 4 years:first

2 years journals

last 2 years

inquiry projects

memory of

field

experience

journals and

inquiry

projects

with

assistance

from

collaboratin

g teacher

and

university

supervisor

journal entries

exhibited

mostly low

levels of

reflection

centered

around

logistics...PST

s struggles to

put learning

objectives at

the forefront

of their

planning...did

not reflect on

the impact on

student

learning

inquiry

projects...all

but 2 focused

on student

learning

It makes sense that the

guided inquiry resulted in

greater reflection than

writing in isolation because

of knowledgeable others.

Without creating warranted

assertabilites about student

learning, is this helpful?

Delandshire &

Arens, 2003

3 teacher ed

programs

memory of

field

experience

s

portfolio

entries

Reflections in

portfolios

were actually

brief

summaries

There was no dialectic

tension present.

159


El-Dib, 2007 50 randomly

selected action

research projects

trying to test the

validity of the

tool he created to

level reflection

in action

research projects

analyzed

reflective units

in the PST’s

writing in each

stage of action

research

:planning

memory of

field

experience

s

action

research

planning: 86%

of the students

were at the

low to low

medium levels

acting: 73%

were at the

low or low

medium levels

reviewing:

59% were at

the low-

medium low

levels

overall 95%

of participants

showed low to

low-medium

levels of

reflection

action

research done

in isolation

does not seem

to promote

reflection

How might a

knowledgeable other

supported throughout this

process?

160


Genor, 2005 7 PST’s

bi-monthly study

group meetings

about field

experiences

memory

field

experience

study group

discussion

with peers

most

conversations

were un-

problematized

reflection

very few

problematized

reflection

examples

How might a

knowledgeable other help

to problematize the PSTs

experience?

Does this amount to

creating dissonance with

the pre-service teacher?

Giovannelli,

2003

55 PST’s

quantitative

N/A N/A reflective

dispositions

are correlated

with effective

teaching

Griffin, 2003 N=135 entries

from 28

participants

deductive

analysis

memory of

field

experience

critical

incident

paper

87% of

incidents we

written at the

lower two

levels

No dialectic tension when

writing in isolation

Hamlin, 2004 comparison

study

memory of

field

experience

structured

critical

incident

papers

Participants

write about

the ethical and

political

consequences

of education

using

structured

paper not high

levels in free

topic situation

Could this be merely

writing to the prompt rather

than engaging in the

reflective process?

161


Harford &

MacRuairc,

2008

PST’s evaluated

the practice of

their peers

1 played a 10

minute video

chunk and the

facilitator

facilitated the

conversation

about the clip

with peers

10 PST’s

self

selected 10

minute

video clip

of their

own

teaching

field

experience

discussion

with peers

and a

facilitator

reflections

deepened over

time

starting with

peers

commenting

on the positive

aspects of the

video

with the aide

of facilitator

prompts ...led

to more

critical

analysis

The presence of a

knowledgeable other

faciltated the reflection

process.

Did the PST’s leave with

warranted assertabilities

about teaching and

learning?

Harland &

Wondra, 2011

comparative

study on depth of

reflection on end

of semester

papers vs. blogs

used modified

Kembers

typology to level

reflection (non-

reflective,

understanding,

reflection, levels,

critical

descriptive

statistics

67 PSTs

memory of

field

experience

s

paper-

structured

by prompts

or blog -no

structure

Paper:

16.7% no

reflection

75%

understanding

8.3%

reflection

0% critical

reflection

Bogs:

7%

nonreflection

62.8%

understanding

30.2%

reflection

0%

critical

blog entries

were shorter

than the paper

reflections

Maybe some interaction is

helpful with peers but we

are still not engaging in

reflection that results in

warranted assertabilites that

can be used to inform

future action.

162


Hobbs, 2007 Ethnography

12 PST’s

memory of

field

experience

journals

Inauthentic

reflection,

negative

attitudes

towards

journals

Are pre-service teachers

able to reflect in isolation

but just choose not to?

Husu, Toom,

& Patrikainen,

2008

Mixed Methods

8 PST’s

video of

field

experience

conversation Video

stimulated

discussions

resulted in low

levels of

reflection but

meet the needs

of preservice

teachers

Is it enough to ‘meet the

needs’ of the pre-service

teacher?

At what point does

thinking about their field

experiences result in


about teaching and

learning?

163


Khourey-

Bowers (2005)

guiding question

provided each

week by

instructor

analyzed threads

using Pathwise

levels of

reflection

22 middle

childhood PST’s

field

experience

observing

classroom

teacher

required/gra

ded on-line

dialogues

with peers

and

instructor

dialogic

interaction

with peers and

moderate

support from

instructor in

the form of

questions

resulted in

reflective

threads

What about judgement?

I have a problem with the

leveling system...a

satisfactory is characterized

by the PST being able to

note the strengths and

weaknesses of an

experience in relation to

learning goals-is noting the

strength or weakness of a

particular lesson reflecting?

Liakopoulou,

2012

content analysis

a priori- forms of

reflection:

technocratic,

interpretive,

critical

68 secondary

pre-service

teachers

field

experience

and micr-

teaching

experience

reflection

reports

most reflected

in the

technocratic

form

most did not

receive

feedback from

supervisors

well

Was any of it reflection?

They wrote what they did

and why it does not seem

that any new understanding

of teaching and learning

came about.

164


Nagle, 2009 descriptive

statistics

memory of

field

experience

portfolio Due to specific

topics for

entries the

portfolio

hinders

opportunities

for critical

reflection

What role did dissonance

play?

Ng & Tan, ? 21 post graduate

pre-service

teachers

qualitative

thematic content

analysis

field

experience

asynchronou

s online

discussion

with peers

about ill-

structured

problems

encountered

during field

experiences

24%

articulated the

problem space

77% relied on

person

experience the

“worked for

them”

16% consider

alternative

solutions

0%

implemented

and monitored

the solution

It seems that judgement

and background knowledge

of teaching is needed for

problem setting.

Otienoh, 2010 phenomenology memory of

field

experience

journals Feedback on

reflective

journals is

perceived as

negative

What do PST’s think the

purpose of reflection is?

165


Orland-Barak,

2005 memory of

field

experience

journal

entries

preservice

teachers tend

to show

themselves in

a positive

light

Isn’t this human nature?

How do we make explicit

the purposes of reflection

for PST’s?

Orland-Barak

& Yinon, 2007

14 PST’s

methods course

on discourse in

the classroom

grounded theory

procedures

present three

exemplary cases

field

experience

transcripti

on of a

lesson

respond to

guiding

questions in

writing...end

of year

paper

the meetings

between

theory and

practice are

idiosyncratic

although each

made

connections

they did so in

different ways

: children’s

learning,

practical

issues,

grounded

understanding

of theory and

practice

pre-service

teachers can

reflect beyond

survival skills,

articulate

multiple

concerns

about their

practice, and

think about

them in an

integrative

manner

What about judgement?

Is 3 out of 14 PSTs

enough?

Does one time doing this

help to develop

dispositions of reflection??

166


examining

their own

teaching

induced

reflection

Orland-Barak

& Rachamim,

2009

Action Research

1 PST

and mentor

video of

field

experience

and

mentoring

conversati

on

conversation Video

combined

with a

mentoring

model

enhances

reflection of

mentor

Rhine &

Bryant, 2007

deductive

analysis

video of

field

experience

discussion

board

Video

stimulated

peer online

discussions

resulted in

low levels of

reflection but

met the

preservice

teachers’

needs

peers provide

support and

positive

feedback

Does this meet the needs of

the elementary student?

Samuel &

Betts, 2007 memory of

field

experience

required

journal

entries

levels of

reflection get

higher over

the course of

one academic

year

Or do the PSTs get better at

writing what the professor

wants to hear?

167


Santagata &

Angelici, 2010

comparative

analysis of

variance

between LAF

and the TRF

38 pre-service

teachers

video of

others

teaching

mathe-

matics

Lesson

analysis

framework

to answer

reflective

questions

participants in

the LAF

group

improved their

ability to

analyze over

time

considered

more

alternative

instructional

strategies

become more

critical over

time

both groups

did not change

their ratings

for

effectiveness

of lessons

over time.

What about reflection

coming from one’s own

experience?

Seban, 2009 271 entries from

24 participants

inductive

analysis

descriptive stats

memory of

field

experience

reflective

paper

Little

evidence of

critical

thought

Can writing in isolation

create dialectic tension?

How can new

understandings be formed

when writing in isolation?

168


Sewall, 2008 8 secondary

preservice

teachers

each PST

engaged in one

traditional post

conference and

one video

elicited post

conference

15 minute videos

supervisor

watching the

video at the

same time with

the PST

content analysis

of conversations

memory of

field

experience

and video

of field

experience

dialogue

with

supervisor

the video

elicited

reflection

resulted in

more

reflective

comments by

the PST

the traditional

post

conferences

showed more

reflective

statements

from the

supervisor

PST’s say

they like both

modes

If the supervisor is

watching the video for the

first time how is she

attending to balance (too

new/too old)?

What does this do to the

quality of the conversation?

Does the video enhance the

quality of the conversation

or is it just there?

Sharma,

Phillion, &

Malewski,

2011

49 PST’s

5 week study

abroad

qualitative

thematic analysis

memory of

experience

journal

entries

PST’s

changed their

beliefs about

Honduras and

the people

there

So maybe study abroad is

just right...not too old and

not too new to create an

authentic experience of

dissonance?

169


6 themes: pre-

conceived

notions,

identified

experiences

that create

conflict

between self

and other,

interpret the

experience to

connect to

broader

construction

of meaning,

examine one’s

own belief,

transformation

of beliefs,

recognition

that

perceptions

must undergo

constant

transformation

critical

reflection can

transform and

develop

multicultural

competencies

in PST’s

170


Shoffner, 2009 9 PST’s

inductive

analysis

memory of

field

experience

blogs Reflective

practice can

benefit from

use of

technology

Reports positive findings

but is it really positive for

anyone to comment and

give their opinion?

Tsang, 2003 case study memory of

field

experience

s

journal

entries

Levels of

reflection

increased over

1 year period

Or did the PSTs get better

at writing what the

professor wanted to hear?

Did any of this result in

warranted assertabilities?

Ottesen, 2007 case study

4 PST’s

memory of

field

experience

conversation 3 modes of

reflection:

reflection as

induction,

concept

development,

imagined

practice-

mostly low

levels of

reflection but

meet the

needs of

preservice

teachers

But does it meet the needs

of the elementary student?

171


Rideout &

Koot, 2009

comparative

study of two

programs P1-

369, P2 27 one

taking

questionnaires

quantitative

N/A N/A reflective,

humanistic

approaches to

teacher ed

results in

humanistic,

student

centered

beliefs in pre-

service

teachers

reflective

practices

included:

written

journals,

research

assignments,

practicum

supervision to

make theory

to practice

connections,

ample time in

the field,

embracing

cognitive

dissonance,me

aningful

collaboration

in triads (PST,

collaborating

teacher, and

university

faculty, peer

collaboration)

What are the pedagogies of

facilitating reflection with

PSTs?

172


Rosaen,

Lundenburg,

Cooper,

Fritzen, &

Terpstra, 2008

Case study3

PST’s

video of

field

experience

written

reflections

Engaging in

video editing

enhances

reflection

more than

relying on

memory

What role did judgment

play here?

Rocco, 2010 ? memory of

field

experience

critical

letters

on-line

discussion

board

Use of

discussion

board engages

students with

one another to

imagine future

possibilities

Are possibilities

warranted?

Rodman, 2010 120 PST’s over

6 sections of a

theory course

with a field

component at the

end of 80 hour

field experience

were asked to

respond to

reflective

questions

grounded theory

memory of

field

experience

written

responses to

questions

content

focused on :

learner

characteristics

, classroom

management.

teaching

strategies

reflections

moved from

teacher

centered to

student

centered

focused on

organization

and applying

specific

strategies

What did they learn?

What do they now

understand about teaching

and learning?

173


Singer & Zeni,

2004

61 PST’s

action research

memory of

field

experience

Listserv retell

frustrations

and give each

other advice

Do PST’s have the content

knowledge to give advice

about teaching and

learning?

Stegman, 2007 Case Study6

PST’s

memory of

field

experience

conversation Preserv

ice teachers

engage in low

levels of

reflection

Could they do more if the

knowledgeable other

created dialogic tension?

Whipp, 2003 deductive

analysis

memory of

field

experience

email Levels of

reflection

evidenced by

emails

increased

when

scaffolding

was provided

This makes sense.

What role did judgment

play when the PSTs relied

on self-selected aspects of

their experience?

Wunder, 2003 21 PST’s

deductive

Memory

of field

experience

written

essays

Participants

displayed 3

levels of

reflection:

management,

student

involvement,

purposes.

Participants

displayed the

two lower

levels most

Is reflection topic specific?

Could one reflect and

create a warranted

assertabilty about

management and its

relation to student

learning?

174


Yesilbursa,

2011

28 PST’S

enrolled in a

methods class

then the

following year in

a field based

setting

thematic analysis

using a priori

self generated

rubric

mixed methods

video of

them in a

micro-

teaching

situation (a

40 min

lesson

teaching

their

peers)

written

journal entry

28.64% were

negative

reflections

27.81% were

positive

reflections

19.87%

neutral

description

13.15%

reflection on

reasons

6.58%

reflection on

solutions

on what do

they reflect

67.45% on

themselves as

teachers

17.68% the

actions of the

students and

their teaching

partners

9.86% the task

they were

involved in

5.01% their

past and

future

experiences

Is teaching peers the same

as K12 students?

What warranted

assertabilities could be

created about teaching

one’s peers and do those

warranted assertabilties

work in experiences with

K12 students?

175

Appendix C

Locating Dissonance, Judgment, Knowledgeable Others, and Dialectic Tension

Author, Date Dissonance Judgment Knowledge-

able Others

Dialectic Tension

Husu et al., 2008 “the focus of

the reflective

discussion is

the critical

incident that

the teacher has

chosen from

among other

incidents in

the video-

taped lesson”

(p. 41)

“the teacher

has chosen

from among

other incidents

in the video-

taped lesson”

(p. 41)

“Reflection

needs to

happen in

interaction

with other

people. This is

crucial

because

expressing

one’s ideas or

thoughts to

others with

sufficient

clarity for

them to

understand,

reveals both

the strengths

and

weaknesses in

one’s

thinking”

(p.38)

“reflective

discussions...the

aim here is to

consider its

meanings in a

wider context, and

explore the

possibilities for

changing the

teacher’s actions”

(p.41)

176

Appendix C (continued)


able Others

Dialectic Tension

Rhine & Bryant,

2007

unclear “depending on

the lesson and

teaching

segment pre-

service

teachers

selected to

share” (p.351)

“the digital

video

assignment

provided a

means for pre-

service

teachers to

solicit and

offer support

and positive

feedback” (p.

351)

“discussion among

their peers helped

our pre-service

teachers gain the

kind of immediate

and specific

nurturing that was

an essential part of

developing their

confidence”

(p.351)

Rosaen et al., 2008 unclear “interns

explained

their

reasoning for

selecting

particular

video

excerpts” (p.

350)

“the

reflections

based on

memory were

typically

written in

paragraph

form where

interns

described

what

happened,

shared

impressions,

and made

comments

about what

stood out to

them in the

lesson”

(p.351)

“the reflections

based on memory

were typically

written in

paragraph form

where interns

described what

happened, shared

impressions, and

made comments

about what stood

out to them in the

lesson” (p.351)

177

Appendix C (continued)


able Others

Dialectic Tension

Shoffner, 2009 unclear “Each

preservice

teacher

determined

the content

and frequency

of weblog

postings”

(p.148)

“anyone who

has an internet

connections

can just come

on in and

agree with

you or

disagree, give

you advice

(p.156)

“comment on

fellow

preservice

teachers’

weblogs”

(p.148)

“you can get other

people’s feedback”

(p.156)

178

Appendix D: Graphic Organizer of Created Patterns

Reflection as Communal Activity Reflection as Non-Communal

Activity

Writing as Medium of

Reflection


Without

Support

free topic

journal entries

With

Support

prompts

guiding

questions

video

Dialogic Interaction as Medium of Reflection


Asynchronous

Environments

(blogs, bulletin boards,

email) conversations)

Synchronous |

Environments

Writing as

medium

of for

dialogue

with peers

Writing as

medium of

dialogue

with peers

and

instructors

Conversation

with peers as

medium of

reflection

Conversation

with

instructors as

medium of

reflection

Conversation

with peers as

medium of

reflection

179

Appendix E: Data Creation Timeline

Time Primary Sources Secondary Sources

Fall 2012, Spring 2013 Six videos of Dana and I

engaging in teaching cycles

These videos represent where

reflection occurred between her

and I

We used one of these videos to

guide our third conversation

February 2013 First conversation with

Dana about her

experience of reflection

February 2013-April 2013 Analysis of first

conversation

April 2013 Testing of initial

themes/ideas with Dana

Second conversation

with Dana about

reflection

April 2013 -May 2013 Analysis of second

conversation

May 2013 Testing of initial

themes/ideas from

second conversation and

revisiting ideas from

first conversation

Third conversation with

Dana about reflection

July 2013 Brief conversation about

final themes

180

Appendix F: Post-Conference Video Viewing Log

Video

Segment

Description Interpretation Question

4:51 hypothesis

she appears confused

not if/then format

more of a casual

experience

How role did

the hypothesis

play in your

thinking?

6:11 Dana describing

lesson did a good job

she appears confident

and in a telling mode

rathe than a making

meaning mode

comfortable How would you

describe your

comfort level

right now?

7:04 reading from notes in

a list form

matter of factly..like

a check list

8 pillars not much

help in viewing video

but yes in planning

look for engagement

first

is the child making

progress

mark what you don’t

like about your

teaching and how

you can fix it

What role did

the 8 pillars play

when you were

coding your

video?

8:22 I am going on and on

clarifying a providing

the rationale

Dana is staring at me

and nodding her head

she is taking some

notes

good thing like to

hear..

What is this like

for you?

181

Appendix F (continued)

Video

Segment

Description Interpretation Question

8:58 teaching me how to

talk about these

things

10:41 I create dissonance

Dana’s face turning

red

Dana felt

uncomfortable

because of the

consequences for the

children in the

moment “ I can’t

believe I did that to

the children

What does this

feel like? What

is your comfort

level here?

13:00 create dissonance

about level of text

Dana staying with the

dissonance by

explaining

I was uncomfortable

slightly.....what you

thought was a good

lesson now im im

changing my mind

stay with ...know my

motive and her goal

Why do you

think you don’t

shut down- you

ask me

questions, you

agree or

disagree with

me, etc.

18:09ish you leap to another

thought by yourself

of dissonance and

thought it ..this idea

was already coded by

Dana

N/A

182

Appendix G: Initial Phrases, Clusters, Themes

Initial Phrases Clusters Themes

Conversation 1

I have grown the ability to reflect is

inherent

role of knowledgeable

other in reflection:

challenge, respect,

bounce ideas off of

when I first started I

thought...and now I

can’t believe I thought

that

things that have

developed her ability to

reflect

the ability to reflect was

developed

I am one of those people reflecting alone: what,

how, the impetus for

reflecting

dispositions matter

I think a lot about my

teaching then (at work)

watching video of her

teaching

dissonance is

experienced throughout

the reflection process

not only as an impetus

how I would change

instruction

teaching cycles: what,

how, effects of

writing plays a role in

being in the moment

when observing others

teach and when in

conferences

I think about myself

when I was in

elementary school

reflecting with peers:

what. when,

characteristics of,

impetus for

reflecting alone is

operationalized as

problem-solving

I feel like I am having a

lot of trouble

effects of

reflection...outcomes

interaction with others

is essential to create

tension (challenge)

thinking deeply with

another

183

Appendix G (continued)


I think I do more in the

moment

disposition dissonance feels bad

because she feels

responsible for the

children’s learning

problems...causes me to

start thinking

difficulty understanding the

motive of the person

you are reflecting with

affects how open she is

being in the moment

[how she notices

problems]

what reflection feels

like when it is done

having firm beliefs

about something and

experiencing or seeing

the opposite creates

dissonance

reflecting in the moment

is like double thinking

reflecting with others

[not me or peers]

beliefs about teaching

come from trying things

out to see if they work

like big ideas interaction with others

[what its like]

reflecting with peers is

different from reflecting

with knowledgeable

others

I have a list of things I

will do

dissonance

think about specific

things I do throughout

the day

Challenge

[watching video}

different than in the

moment of teaching

role of writing

[in the moment] I’m

thinking

about...concepts they

need to understand

beliefs and their

relationship to challenge

[watching video] I think

about what I say

motives

think about different

ways I could do it

184



this is really hard

some people just find

the benefits of reflecting

I have benefitted from

reflecting

went through a really

hardship...I changed a

lot it was due to

reflecting

to create change

I want change

you want ideas

[describing the

relationship with ct’s]

when I reflect alone I

am planning for next

time...literally next time

reflect with you I think

about my general

teaching perspective

it has more to do with

who I am a as a person

more literal when I am

thinking alone

with you I am thinking

about my teaching

philosophy

deeper reflection on my

teaching [reflecting with

me]

185



I use that to influence

my literal each little

thing

something that you just

do are

it felt really good to

figure that out

something that is like

intrinsic

feel like you

accomplished

something

it is hard for us because

these is so much going

on

a beginning of an idea

may be formed

tiny little bits of sparks

you helped me ///guided

me

it is hard for me...it is

hard for me to respect

their ideas

[knowledgeable other]

we just talk about what

went on [talking with

peers]

what strategies we can

try

why these kids are at a

first grade level

186



why do they hate adults

we have a really close

relationship [peer]

we have a lot of the

same ideals

easy for me to talk

I don’t have concrete

beliefs of my own [the

difference of talking

with those big things

with Tiffany]

I don’t have any idea

about any of it

I expect to be

challenged [teaching

cycles]

my beliefs to be

challenged

me to think critically

about my beliefs

sharing ideas throwing

stuff out there [peers]

don’t expect a deeper

level of challenge

[peers]

if you don’t have

somebody to think

critically with then you

can’t grow

you don’t have anything

to be your rock

187



just not deep thinkers

haven’t found the right

person to be a deep

thinker with

I feel safe

my education was far

better than what my

peers have had

I have really connected

I have been able to grow

I have experienced deep

thinking

I feel comfortable

[teaching cycles]

I feel excited

I get excited

you respect my ideas

as a deep thinker you

get deeper

I can have a deep

conversation with you

no problem

I am not a worrier

it has to do with what I

went through

188


Conversation 2


like a snowball effect

I got a little taste of it

with those two people

I took that

I really liked that feeling

I tried to have it with

other people

if I could get there it

kept snowballing

I could get there even

more

I enjoyed that feeling

I learned from it

I could get there with

more people

feel like it was a worthy

way to spend time

I just experienced it

I enjoyed it

I kept doing it

more reflective with

time

in different ways

for different reasons

189



different purposes

something that could be

taught

something that could be

developed

maybe it can’t be taught

if you have those kinds

of experiences

you watch other people

have those kinds of

experiences

if you feel you want to

have those kinds of

experiences

you might try to get

there too

I used to reflect on more

philosophical things like

life

especially when i was

sick

I was always thinking

about death

that was more just me

on my own

I still keep in touch with

those two humans that i

think deeply with

190



we have all of these

conversations

the ones we have

recently are all about

teaching

they are like teachers

they can relate to that

kind of reflection

one was a high school

teacher

the other my 5th grade

teacher

I take that back my fifth

grade teacher I wouldn’t

say we think deeply

together

she is a surgeon

my youth group leader

in highschool

she is the deepest

she was a philosophy

major

she will just challenge

to no end

especially with ethics

I am very passionate

about assisted suicide

she is a surgeon

191



we always have intense

conversations

I saw him once in this

state

it crushed me

to see him decrepit was

painful

knowing he was in pain

knowing he was going

to die

especially knowing he

was ready to die

he wanted to die

physical assisted suicide

is illegal

that started me being

upset

we would have

conversations

he would challenge me

thinking deeply

about my ethics

loved that feeling

like challenging myself

192



to really pick a side

you have to say where

do you draw the line

I take a lot of notes

if I am not teaching i am

writing

I often do not look back

at my notes

I literally take them

I think the act of taking

them makes me think

about them

it is like disequilibrium

if a see something

if a kid is trying his

hardest struggling and

still doesn’t get it

then I have to figure out

how I can go about it

in a different way to

make him understand

thinking about what

things I have tried

what things other people

have tried

193



thinking about what step

in his learning was

missing compared to

other students

I catch myself not

paying attention to what

the kids are saying

not being in the moment

not taking in what my

environment says

applying it to what i

already know so i can

change it for the future

that is another reason

why i write

because writing keeps

me focused on what i

need to be doing

cause even if i don’t

even look back at the

notes

I wrote them down

they are kind of like

somewhere in my brain

I am looking for them

[problems]

when a kid clearly gets

it

194



I want him to get to the

next level

I want them to feel the

struggle

so they can get to the

next level

I actively look for signs

if he is close

I am so obnoxiously

picky about how i feel

teaching should be

it is a constant line of

disequilibrium to me

I am constantly thinking

about how i would

change my instruction

so that it wouldnt look

like that

what it would look like

will be teaching

she is always asking me

for advice

how she can improve

her teaching

she’s very receptive

when I give her advice

I’m writing writing

writing

195



I’m writing things she’s

doing that i dont like

i look at my notes

you could have done

this a little differently

when we talk about it

she justifies why she did

whatever she did

then I think about that

and you know what it

actually seems logical

it is nice when

somebody will stand up

for their own ways

challenge me to think

about whatever I’m

thinking

challenging my views

that I was passionate

about

completely dedicated to

challenging those

I think challenge is a

piece of it

it takes courage to say I

didn’t like that

if I don’t know you well

enough

I am very open

I will challenge

anybody

196



I’m gonna stick up for

whatever I believe

I have such firm beliefs

when I see something

that doesn’t agree with

my beliefs I want to

challenge it

I want you to defend

why you didn’t do what

I believe

it has to do with control

I know I will have

control over my future

classroom

I know that I need to be

firm in whatever I

believe

we went tutoring we

were talking about

racism

she was saying that the

things I was saying were

racist

I don’t think of myself

as racist

she was saying that was

racist

I was trying to defend

myself

197



because I don’t have

firm beliefs about that

kind of thing I don’t

know enough about it

I can’t really defend

myself because I don’t

know anything

I just see it think about

it but I don’t have firm

beliefs

I don’t have any

experiences in

classrooms other than

these two years

I have no idea

that is kind of scary

that I have these super

firm beliefs and I don't

even know where they

came from

when i am challenged i

feel excited about

learning i think that

applies for every student

the conversations that

we had in our

coursework were

beneficial to me

I would have to see the

conversations then see

teaching literacy to be

able to compare if they

didn't match up

198



this doesn’t work, this is

supposed to work but I

don’t see it anywhere

then I got to teach

I tried these thing that

we learned

I saw them work

compared to the other

things that were not

working

because I tried it and

saw it work

I personally benefit a lot

more from this kind of

interaction

maybe it is the

challenge piece

reading tells you facts it

doesn’t challenge me

its educating me but I

don’t know if it is true

I actually go try it and i

can say this aspect of

this worked

I’d rather be challenged

Conversation 3

when we first started

doing the hypothesis

I didn’t really get what

we were doing

199



I was able to actually

have a purpose for the

hypothesis

not in an if/then format

I saw what was going

on

we discussed it

I’m gonna try this other

thing that i think will

work better

maybe it wasn’t as

formal as writing it out

I definitely did the

process

but later I saw the

benefits

it was comfortable

if I wasn’t comfortable

teaching it then I

wouldn’t be comfortable

talking about it

I don’t think in

watching the video the 8

pillars really helped

but in planning it did

after I planned I was

like Ok what kinds of

things am I missing

the first thing I look for

is engagement

if the kids are off the

walls I am not happy

200



I think about how I can

change

after I see that the kids

are in whatever text they

are looking at

then I try to compare

at the beginning of the

lesson here is what I

know about this kid

is he making progress to

where I want him to be

at

or is he just staying still

I write down if I don’t

like something

I write down how I

would fix it

I don’t think it is

annoying

you are taking what I

am saying and justifying

it

if you were saying what

I did was totally wrong

here is how you need to

fix it

but you have never done

that

you were saying that is

ok here is why

201



I wasn't coming up with

it on my own

I needed someone else

to say what the rationale

was

I wasn’t getting it

you were teaching me

how to talk

you did that in a

heartbeat [create

dissonance]

it feels like how could I

do that...these poor

children

all they need to know

how to do is read and I

am only letting them

read 3 min.

its about kids

in the moment you

don’t think about the

future

you are just thinking

about now

both of these things are

crucial you can’t not say

them

202



but if they were littler

things maybe you could

go ahead

but I would have spent

more time on the time

thing

at the time was like oh

my god I can’t believe I

did that

right now I have the

same feeling

I don’t think I did

anything about it

its hard sure

its a challenge

you have to figure out

what I did what i am

doing now

its hard for me to get

uncomfortable

I just pretend I’m not

long enough to get

comfortable again

I like being

uncomfortable

I’m probably not

wicked comfortable

I’m realizing that I was

confident but now not

so much

203



so obviously you are

going to be

uncomfortable

but I don’t think it is a

bad thing

what I thought was a

good lesson I am now

changing my mind

I don’t think the blame

is on you

you are presenting me

with ideas that is

making me change my

own mind

I know your motive

I know my goal

your motive it is to get

me to be a better teacher

my goal is to be a better

teacher

I know no matter what

your motive is it is not

to judge me

your motive is to really

get me to be a better

teacher

to get me to reflect on

my own

204



I don’t care if you think

I am a good teacher

because I know my role

as an intern is to grow

its not be a good teacher

its to learn and be a

better teacher

it is just it wasn’t from

you it was from me

I just wanted to bring up

with you at the moment

like when I am watching

the videos

I really have to be harsh

and write whatever i

think

then kind of say it to

you

you know does she

think that is a good idea

I got it all written down

cause like I forget I get

it all out

want them to feel

challenged

she wants me to be

comfortable

when they don’t feel

comfortable they think

Oh this must be going

wrong

205

Appendix H: Essential Themes Related to the Experience of Reflection

Themes My Thinking Incidental or Essential

role of knowledgeable

other in reflection:

challenge, teaching her

how to talk, bounce ideas

off of

this is how she experiences

the knowledgable other but

there is a theme below that

captures this better

Incidental

the ability to reflect was

developed

an important idea but if this

ability was developed or

inherent I don’t think it would

change her experience of

reflecting

Incidental

dispositions matter important but is related to the

other theme about the

relationship between motives

of knowledgeable others and

dispositions

Incidental

dissonance is experienced

throughout the reflection

process not only as an

impetus

without the experience of

dissonance throughout the

process I don’t think she

would have experienced

reflection

Essential

writing plays a role in

being in the moment when

observing others teach and

when in conferences

without writing she would not

experience being in the

moment to read her

experience

Essential

reflecting alone is

operationalized as

problem-solving

I think this is incidental

because as she describes this

process it is not necessarily

producing warranted

assertabilities so is it really

reflection then?

Incidental

206

Appendix H (continued)

Themes My Thinking Incidental or Essential

interaction with

knowledgeable others is

essential to create tension

(challenge) thinking

deeply with another

this is what she describes

about the feeling of thinking

deeply with another and how

they challenge her to

reconsider her beliefs

Essential

dissonance feels bad

because she feels

responsible for the

children’s learning

I think this is important but

can be placed with dissonance

throughout the reflection

process

Incidental

understanding the motive

of the person you are

reflecting with affects how

open she is

this has implications for

cultivating dispositions

this can be under the theme of

interaction with

knowledgeable others

Essential

having firm beliefs about

something and

experiencing or seeing the

opposite creates

dissonance

without firm beliefs about

teaching she would not

experience dissonance but this

can be included in the

dissonance throughout the

process theme

Essential

beliefs about teaching

come from trying things

out to see if they work

regardless of how these

beliefs were formed she has

them and they are experienced

in reflection as described in

the above theme

Incidental

reflecting with peers is

different from reflecting

with knowledgeable others

again although she associates

talking with peers as

reflection as she describes it it

does not really lead to


Incidental

207

Appendix I: Eight Pillars of Effective Literacy Instruction

Balanced, Comprehensive Instruction

A Lot of Reading and Writing

Science and Social Studies Integrated

High-Level Thinking

Skills Explicitly Taught and Coached

Wide Variety of Materials

Variety of Formats for Instruction

Well Managed

(Cunningham & Allington, 2011)

Documents

Insights Into Reflection and Pre-service Teacher Education